Dave's Combiner Wars Rant: Protectobot Limbs

[Dave Van Domelen]

Dave's Combiner Wars Rant: Deluxe Wave 3 - Protectobots

Protectobot Blades (Defensor 1, Alpha Bravo retool)
Protectobot Rook (Defensor 2, SWAT MRAP)
Protectobot First Aid (Defensor 4, Offroad retool)
Protectobot Streetwise (Defensor 5, Dead End retool)

Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/DeluxeC3

And now we get into the heavy retool territory, with only one completely
new mold among the four. And we'll see these again...at least three more
Alpha Bravo retools coming (Vortex, two Victorion limbs), at least one more
Offroad retool (Ironhide), and a retool of the Streetwise retool (Prowl).

http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/DeluxeC1 - Alpha Bravo mold
http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Gen/DeluxeC2 - Dead End, Offroad molds

Note, Takara has designed a Deluxe-scale Groove to replace Rook, but
as of the initial writing of this review, Hasbro was not willing to commit to
a U.S. release of the mold, citing higher production costs than normal for
the price point. It hasn't been ruled out, but neither has it been ruled in.


CAPSULES

$15-20 price point (high end at TRU).

Blades: Original mold was mildly recommended, this is a case of being no
better or worse in absolute terms, but it does have the potential advantage
of not being a brand new character, for those who skipped the mold when it
was called Alpha Bravo.
Rook: Leg mode is a bit wonky, but this new mold is otherwise pretty
good. Solid arm, good robot, good (if slightly creepy in light of recent
national events) vehicle mode. Recommended.
First Aid: Original mold was not actualy rated on my usual scale, but I
didn't care for it. This fixed a lot of the problems, although not all of
them. Mildly recommended.
Streetwise: Original mold was mildly recommended, as with First Aid this
retool does fix some problems. However, there's still some fundamental
issues, plus this mold feels like it was intended for Prowl more than
Streetwise. Mildly recommended.


RANTS

Packaging: Same as Wave 2, with a sort of deep aqua as the team accent
color.

AUTOBOT: PROTECTOBOT BLADES
Component: Right arm
Altmode: Helicopter
Transformation Difficulty: 13 steps
Previous Name Use: AoE sort of (the Protectobots Evac Squad used AoE
trade dress, all other Blades characters were either just Blades or
Autobot Blades)
Previous Mold Use: Gen
Weapon: Photon Blaster, wrist missiles, helicopter blades
Function: Warrior
Motto: "It's only too close if YOU hit ME."

Blades can take his alternate form - a chopper - a little too
literally. Sure, he carries plenty of firepower, but he'd much rather shred
enemies with his rotors, bringing them down with a whirling flurry of copter
kung fu.

Packaging: 4 ties on the robot, 1 each on the gun (which has awfully big
shell cartridges for a photon blaster) and the appendage weapon.

Comic: Labeled Combiner Wars #11, it's Onyx Interface Part 1 from The
Transformers #35. Onyx Interface revealed that the Enigma of Combination was
on Earth, so at least the arc is relevant, even if it has no actual
combining.

Color Swaps: White becomes red, light gray becomes white, black becomes
light gray. The rifle is still black, as is the appendage (with a white
hinge).

Paint Apps: The fists and wrist missiles are painted silver...dipped in
it, really. There's also silver on the pecs and waist to evoke the look of
G1 Blades, with a red Autobot symbol printed on the right pec. The face is
painted metallic light blue with metallic medium blue eyes.
In vehicle mode, there's a white stripe along each side, including on
the tail side bpieces. The word RESCUE is printed at the rotor root on eithe
rside, the windows are painted black. As with Alpha Bravo, no paint on the
windows. The fenestron rotor is painted silver. On each tail side, RESCUE
is printed below the stripe, and on the stripe a rescue logo is printed. The
logo has a small Autobot symbol in front of a globe and crossed anchors, with
the small writing AUTOBOT COASTAL RESCUE around the border, and even smaller
writing that's almost too blurry to make out at all. The top word seems to
be SEMPER. On the left side the bottom word is more readable, it looks to be
REFEREMUS. "Semper Referemus" is not the Coast Guard motto (that's "Semper
Paratus" or "always ready"). Poking around some online Latin dictionaries
leads to the same conclusion as TFWiki reached, that it means "Always bring
them back."

Mold Changes: The head has been remolded to look like the G1 toy's
head. That's it. This is the most unchanged of the three retools.

Other Notes: None. I do hope that at least some of the future reuses of
this basic mold do more than head-swap, though.

Overall: Well, it has the advantage of being based on (and looking
reasonably like) a G1 character, rather than being made up for Combiner
Wars. Otherwise, it's a so-so mold in design and this is really no better or
worse than the Alpha Bravo version.


AUTOBOT: PROTECTOBOT ROOK
Component: Left arm
Altmode: SWAT MRAP
Transformation Difficulty: 9 steps
Previous Name Use: None ("Rook" along was Armada)
Previous Mold Use: None
Weapon: Hydraulic Claw
Function: Strategist
Motto: "Bringing everyone back alive is the best strategy."

If you need a rescue deep behind enemy lines or deep beneath battlefield
rubble, Rook can get it done. His durabyllium super-alloy armor can
withstand punishing blasts and hold up under crushing weight, and his vast
tactical knowledge can get him out of any jam.

The extra characterization on the back cover of the comic suggests he
doesn't just kinda resemble RiD Strongarm, he has a very similar personality
and "fresh out of the academy" nature. While others have gone all Russkie
with him because of the hat, I see him more as a cop in some big city with
cold winters, like Philly or Boston. Maybe Minneapolis, dontchaknow.

Packaging: Six ties on the robot, one each on the claw and appendage.

Comic: Labeled Combiner Wars #10, it's Transformers: Robots in Disguise
#34 (the last issue before they retitled it just "The Transformers" to avoid
confusion with the new series).

Robot Mode: Where PRiD Strongarm is modeled after SWAT riot gear, this
guy is modeled after winter patrol gear, including a helmet shaped like the
furry trooper hat (the kind with the earflaps that button up on the sides for
when it's cold enough to need to silly hat but not cold enough to put the ear
flaps down), complete with chinstrap. Oddly, it also has a sort of braces-
retainer bar across the face under the nose. There's even an Autobot symbol
on the forehead of the hat, like a badge. Gas tanks from the sides of the
vehicle end up on the shoulders and look like winter coat external pockets.
If you want to increase the greatcoat look, you can fold the backpack down
behind the legs. A non-cop-related design oddity is that the hands aren't
molded to hold pegs normally...instead, there's cannon muzzles molded into
the fists, with pegs intended to peg in the long way (which lets the weapon
attach as a G1-Inferno-style hand-tool). There's a wheel under each armpit,
and two on the outer side of each boot.
5.5" (14cm) tall in a mix of black, white, gray, and blue, plus a bit of
silver. The backpack shell, shoulders, forearms, boots, and toes are white
plastic. The upper arms, collar, thighs, and struts inside the boots are
medium blue plastic. The shoulder struts, combiner peg, knees, and heels are
silvery gray plastic. The head, wheels, torso, and backpack struts are black
plastic.
The face and gas-can-pockets on the shoulders are painted silver.
There's blue paint on the chest, eyes, and toes. There's also silver and
blue paint on the insides of the forearms, for vehicle mode stuff. The
kneecaps are painted black, and POLICE is printed in black on the shoulders.
The Autobot symbol on the helmet forehead is red on silver.
The head is on a restricted ball joint, and can nod a little, while the
waist is a swivel where the vertical part of the pelvis meets the horizontal
part. Ball joint shoulders on struts that swing backwards for transformation
(when in the proper position all the way forward, the shoulder struts lock
down the wheels in the armpits). Upper arm swivels, hinge elbows, ball joint
hips, mid-thigh swivels, hinge knees. There's hinges to let the ankles bend
sideways and keep the feet flat in wide stances. The toes are on
transformation struts, but that yields no useful articulation.
The muzzles on the fists will hold sufficiently long 5mm pegs, plus
there's 5mm peg holes on the shoulders and one on the backpack. There's also
a 5mm peg hole on the left toe, but that's for limb mode. The personal
weapon is meant to evoke a jaws of life rig, with a long peg at the end for
insertion in the fist-muzzle, and a shorter one as more of a traditional grip
for mounting in vehicle mode. It's a single piece of silvery gray plastic
2.5" (6.5cm) long. The appendage weapon is all black plastic and has twin
warhead tips. Amusingly, it can be attached as a hand, thanks to the muzzle
pegholes.

Transformation: A bit tricky, since several panels have to fit over
things. In rough terms, the arms swing back to peg onto the back, the legs
shorten by having the boots swing out to the sides and back in on struts
outside the knees (rather than the usual open-and-fold CW Deluxe trick or the
simpler thigh-collapse seen on Dragstrip). The backpack snaps onto the backs
of the boots, covering the hands and forming a nice angular MRAP shape.

Vehicle Mode: This is basically surplus military gear parceled out to
police departments, something which was not really seen as being QUITE so
sinister when the toy was designed, I expect. It even has a 5mm peg on top
to let the appendage weapon attach as a credible missile turret, for improved
no-knock warrants on people with overdue parking tickets. It has six
oversized wheels, minimal-exposure driver's slits, angled armor, ramplate...
oh, and as a concession to its theoretical role, molded rescue equipment on
the sides (fire axes, human-scale Jaws of Life). Oh, and the general lines
would be appropriate for a Strika toy.
4.25" (11cm) long, and based on various details I'm guessing it's about
1:72 scale, AKA Hot Wheels Scale or 25mm wargaming scale (not that anyone
uses 25mm anymore, it's all 35mm heroic scale when it's consistent at all).
The majority of the shell is white plastic, with only little bits of blue and
gray plastic showing. The rear spine part, including top-mounted 5mm peg, is
black plastic. There's gunmetal paint on some windowlike details in front,
yellow headlights, blue paint along the lower half. The rescue equipment
panels molded on the sides are painted silver. "SWAT" is printed in black on
the sides and on top behind the driver's comparment, with "POLICE" printed on
top of the driver's compartment, and a red-on-silver Autobot symbol printed
behind the rooftop SWAT.
The shoulder peg holes end up in the rear top, the backpack peg hole is
on the right front top even with the driver's compartment, the toes hole is
in the center bumper. The 5mm peg is just behind the midpoint of the
centerline on top. While there's only a millimeter or two of clearance, it
rolls pretty well on the six large (2cm diameter) snap-on wheels.

Combiner Mode: Oddly, neither mode uses the peg hole on the toe, both
have the toes flipped up into robot mode position. Maybe that peg hole is
for mounting the hydraulic clamp to the front.
To get arm mode from robot mode, peg the legs together, flip down the
backpack so the arms can peg to the back a la vehicle mode, then flip the
backpack up over the arms and fold the head back as far as it'll fit. Nicely
compact, solid...a surprisingly good arm for such a bulky vehicle. The only
downside is that like the Stunticon appendages, there's no tab to help get
the fingers pulled out.
To get leg mode from vehicle mode, fold the backpack piece up to where
it covers the arms like in arm mode, flip the toes down, and fold up the
combiner peg. The result is a HUGE kneecap, like Torgo levels of kneecap.
Unfortunately, using the peg hole in the toes to try to make the leg slimmer
results in it being too long. You can sort of bell-bottom it by folding the
bckpack down in front of the feet. This is better as an arm.

Overall: Well, it may be the only totally new mold, but it's a good one
regardless of its company. It's also a little less likely to be reused to
death than some of the other molds, so it's worth picking up now.


AUTOBOT: PROTECTOBOT FIRST AID
Component: Right leg
Altmode: Ambulance
Transformation Difficulty: 8 steps
Previous Name Use: AoE (same deal as Blades)
Previous Mold Use: Gen (heavy reshelling)
Weapon: Crystallizer cannon, cyber cleaver, fist-mounted lasers
Function: Medic
Motto: "Fix ALL THE THINGS."

FIRST AID is just as likelu to be first on the scene to help a wounded
bot as he is to show up to repair a broken dishwaher. To the PROTECTOBOT
medic, the greatest enemy is malfunction. Human, bot, or machine - if it's
broken, FIRST AID won't carry on until it's back up and running.

The comic also indicates he has interpreted his healer's oath a little
creatively...the best way to prevent injuries is to win the war as soon as
possible. So, a little cutting now to prevent a lot of dying later. And
that's a precision surgical axe.

Packaging: Six ties on the robot, one each on the weapons. The hood of
the truck is up over the head in order to avoid sticking out too far in
back.

Comic: Labeled Combiner Wars #12, it's The Transformers #36, part 2 of
Onyx Interface.

There's almost no parts in common with Offroad. The weapons, the
wheels, the combiner peg core, a few bits like upper limbs and hinges. All
of the vehicle shell parts and distinctive robot parts are new. So I'll
review this as a new mold.

Robot Mode: While the panels on shoulders and arms prevent a really
close match to either G1 or IDW designs, this reshelling does an otherwise
admirable job. It retains the "vehicle front end backpack" look of the IDW
design, but sticks with the all-red helmet of the G1 models (IDW puts a white
mohawk-crest on it). The upper arms are red on the toy, which doesn't match
any other version, but I prefer the balance that provides. The reshell into
a camper-style truck does make the boots rather deep and clunky, but it helps
in combiner mode. Oh, and the slightly different shape of the shoulder
panels makes it so that they pretty much have to stay against the upper arms,
unlike Offroad where they rise to the sides more easily.
An oddball molded detail is on the sides, under the arms. A trio of
piston-like structures which may be intended as medical tools.
5.25" (13cm) tall at the head, a bit more for the backpack rising up
behind the head. The colors are a mix of white, bright red, deep garnet red,
and black, with a little silver. A metalswirled dark garnet plastic is used
on the combiner peg, shoulder roots, upper arms, pelvis, thighs, and knees.
The hinge on the appendage is also garnet. The wheels, axe, and non-hinge
parts of the appendage are black plastic. Everything else is white plastic.
The head is dipped in bright red plastic, with silver faceplate and bright
blue visor. The front of the torso-U shape is also bright red, and there's
bright red paint on the shoulder and arm panels as well as the sides of the
boots. The kneecaps have bright blue rectangles painted on them. The fake
windows on the chest are painted silver, and some details on the "ribcage"
are also painted silver. A red Autobot symbol is printed on the left chest
not-window. The axe blade is painted silver. If you look at the backs of
the boots, there's molded window details that are unpainted, but since
they're also covered up in vehicle mode, there's not much reason to paint
them. No paint on the wheel hubs.
Ball joint neck, swivel waist, ball joint shoulders and hips. Swivels
just above the elbow hinges and below the hip sockets, hinge knees. Shoulder
range of motion is a bit restricted by the armor panels bumping up against
the backpack. The hands can hold 5mm pegs, and there's 5mm peg holes on the
top outer sides of the boots, that's it. No backpack storage for weapons.
Other than colors, the weapons are the same as Offroad's.

Transformation: Obviously, pretty similar to Offroad, but there's hinges
in slightly different places, and it takes rather more force to get the front
end of the vehicle snapped into place. I found it a bit more of a
shellformer (in spirit) in terms of hassles related to getting all the panels
in place. Additionally, some tabs on the vehicle front end have to go into
slots on the torso that are painted over, making the fit tighter (and
resulting in some paint coming off on the tabs).
As with Offroad, I recommend swapping the head into the chest when
turning it into vehicle mode, that will make turning it quickly into a leg
easier.

Vehicle Mode: Doesn't look much like Offroad at all. The driver's cab
roof is sloped down a bit more and has the lightbar on top, and the camper
shell turns the back end into a proper (if cramped) ambulance bay. It has
angled surfaces that suggest armoring, 2mm grip bars on the roof (in case you
have any leftover C-clip system weapons, they can go here), and a tab on the
roof for the appendage weapon. While the appendage can go on top with the
exhaust pipes pointed backwards in this case, it doesn't really look good,
best to point 'em forward as weapons.
Interestingly, this is pretty close to how Prowl looked while he was
part of Devastator in the comics. A pity they couldn't make his Combiner
Wars version a tweak of this mold, rather than a Streetwise retool. (That
would leave Ironhide as either staying a straight headswap of Offroad, or my
preference of a Rook retool with four wheels.)
4.75" (12cm) long, with the shell being red-white-blue. The shell
plastic is entirely white, with black wheels. The lower part of the sides
behind the front fenders are painted red with a white stripe (yes, it's white
paint on top of red paint on top of white plastic, go figure), "EMERGENCY"
printed in white over the rear wheels, and "RESCUE" in white on each door.
The windows of the cab and the side windows of the camper shell are painted
bright blue, but the rear window is unpainted (there is a windshield wiper
molded, though, so it's clearly meant to be a non-opaque window). The front
grille is painted silver, but the headlights are unpainted. The side parts
of the lightbar are painted dark red. A red on silver Autobot symbol is
printed on the left side of the top of the hood.
As noted, there's a tab on top specifically for the appendage block.
There's 5mm peg holes ahead of each rear wheel, and the combiner 5mm peg hole
on the back bumper. I prefer to store the axe on the back, it feels more
appropriate than the side.

Combiner Mode: Same basic engineering as Offroad. The leg mode looks a
bit better thanks to the camper shell, so the huge kneecap isn't as big a
deal, since it's not also compared to a shin that retreats inwards at the
bottom. Sort of a bell bottom jeans look. And like Offroad, you need to
have the peg swapped for the head already if you want to get here from
vehicle mode.
Arm mode is also helped by the camper shell, but the robot arm stowage
is no more convincing or stable. And, unfortunately, part of not remolding
the appendage is that there's no tab for helping get the fingers out.

Overall: It's still got problems, mostly involving the arms. But this
reshell otherwise improves on Offroad in every way. If only they'd decided
to make Offroad this basic shape (minus lightbar) I'd probably like it more.


AUTOBOT: PROTECTOBOT STREETWISE
Component: Left leg
Altmode: Police Interceptor
Transformation Difficulty: 9 steps
Previous Name Use: None (the AoE-era set used Streetsmart)
Previous Mold Use: Gen (heavy retool)
Weapon: Energon blaster, air compressor cannons
Function: Interceptor
Motto: (BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM) "You're under arrest."

Fully capable of wiping out any target, Streetwise would rather track
'em down and let justice take its course. Of course, that justice starts
with heavy damage to a few of his enemy's key systems. They can't do any
harm if they can't function.

I had some significant hassles with this during the time I was reviewing
the group. A crack developed in the right forearm, not sure if it was there
when I got the toy or formed later. I glued it together, but then I bashed
my shin on the desk leg and Streetwise was the only toy to fall off...and
naturally the crack opened back up. So I re-reglued it and then shaved down
part of the detail so I could glue on a thin splint to reinforce it. I could
have gotten away with an even thicker splint, since there's plenty of
clearance in vehicle mode, but still kinda annoying. I'm not a bit surprised
neither Dead End nor Brake-Neck have similar cracks, as the plastic is REALLY
thin in the forearms.

Packaging: Four ties on the robot (oddly, the left leg was left loose),
one each on the new shotgun and old appendage.

Comic: Labeled Combiner Wars #9, this is Transformers: Robots in
Disguise #33, which has the wreckage of Superion, plus Alpha Bravo and
Powerglide.

As with First Aid, this is a nearly complete retool that just happens to
share engineering and a few parts (wheels, appendage, some hinges and upper
limb bits) with its inspiration.

Robot Mode: It's interesting how they made this evoke G1 Streetwise,
despite the fact that the Dead End mold doesn't transform even close to how
G1 Streetwise did. And the mold artists didn't seem to agree with the
painters on how things should work. For instance, the chest panel is clearly
molded to look like a fake hood to match the new real hood, but then it gets
painted all black to evoke the windshield chest of G1 Streetwise. (That
molding decision may have been done for the Prowl retool, tho.) The shins
are molded to look like rear window louvres, and painted down the middle to
sort of evoke the rear windows that form G1 Streetwise's shins. Meanwhile,
the fake tiny wheels molded on the reverse side of the shoulder-panel mounted
5mm peg holes remain, even though Streetwise has no wheels above his
shoulders. Anyway, odd combo. The head is clearly based on the G1 toy, just
de-pegged a bit.
5.5" (14cm) tall, and predominantly dirty white, metallic black, and
garnet red. The same type of garnet red plastic used on First Aid is used
for the combiner peg, pelvis, knees, exhaust pipe combiner connector thing,
the appendage hinge, and part of the strut holding the "dickie" piece on.
The wheels and the rest of the appendage are black plastic. Everything else
is a sort of off white, including the personal weapon.
There's garnet red paint on the forearms and parts of the helmet (a
departure from G1's all-white helmet). The chestplate and shin details are
paitned a sparkly black. The face is silver with medium blue eyes. There's
blue panels on the upper arms with "POLICE" left unpainted in negative
space. The personal wepaon is dipped in gunmetal paint. There's a red on
silver Autobot symbol printed at the center of the chestplate. No paint on
the wheel hubs.
Identical articulation to Dead End, none of the mold changes affect
range of motion. In addition to the cracked forearm, the hips and knees on
mine were very loose, so as long as I had the glue out anyway, I used it to
stiffen the joints.
No wussy double-barrelled shotgun for Streetwise, no way. He has a
TRIPLE-barrelled shotgun/carbine as his personal weapon! 2.5" (6.5cm) long,
a single piece of white plastic dipped in gunmetal paint. The appendage
weapon is the same mold as Dead End, so another that needs a tool or long
fingernails to open up for fist mode.

Transformation: Same as Dead End, but it does seem to hold together more
firmly. Hard to say if this is a direct consequence of the retooled shell,
or just QC roulette, but the back end of the car doesn't bow part in vehicle
mode, and doesn't feel like it's going to break in arm mode. I'm hoping the
remold is to thank for it, though, since this particular shell will also be
used for Prowl.

Vehicle Mode: They didn't just slap a lightbar on top, they totally
changed the lines of the car mode, beefing it up, adding a pushbar in front,
rooftop air vents so Streetwise can drive through shallow water without
choking off his engi...er, he isn't exactly gas-burning, but you get the
point. The side mirrors are moved forward, the hood is vented, and the rear
window is very small because it's stuck between the roof vent paths. The
lightbar is "boomerang" shaped rather than straight.
5" (12.5cm) long, mostly off-white with some red, black, blue, and
gunmetal. The shell is entirely off-white plastic, although some bits of
garnet are visible in back. The lightbar is painted entirely garnet (no
silver or gunmetal in the middle), the pushbar section is painted gunmetal.
The windows, including the rear one, are paitned sparkly black. The
headlights are painted silver. The hood is painted gloss medium blue with
"POLICE" in white printed on that, and a red-on-white Autobot symbol at the
center. There's matte blue on the sides of the front fender swooshing back
onto the doors, with "POLICE" left in negative space.
Much more solidly held-together than either of my other two versions of
the mold. Same peg holes behind the front wheels, so if you store the
shotgun there it will point backwards. The rooftop peg hole on mine is a
better fit for 5mm pegs, probably just random QC luck.

Combiner Mode: Leg mode is functionally identical to Dead End's, just
different looks. As noted above, the arm mode holds together a lot better
than Dead End or Brake-Neck. However, since both Blades and Rook look better
as arms than legs, I'll go ahead and stick with Streetwise as a leg.

Overall: Well, it's my third copy of some version of this basic design,
with more to come before they're done with it. It fixes some of the problems
I found in the Dead End version, but revealed another potential common
issue.


Dave Van Domelen, now to open Hot Spot.