Favourte Gimmicks?

[Superomegaprime]

I've been kind of thinking about this for a few days and sort I thought I ask, what has been your favourte gimmick in Transformers aside from the robot to vehicle and back again?

I would say, the Weaponizer gimmick has been my favourte to date as you can plug parts of other figures onto another to beef them up, via the 5ml ports dotted around the bodies!

Next I would say, combining, when done right, such as the Scramble city type bots or Cybertron Optimus having Wing Saber (Sonic Bomber) attach to give him a different flight mode!

So what are your favourte gimmicks in Transformers? You aren't restricted to one, so you can have a bunch of favourtes.

 

[Sabrblade]

Probably combining and Super Modes.

I'll mention any others I think of, later.

 

[Future_Erika]

yup same
Combining/super modes for me,
but also head/titanmasters which I consider to be under the same umbrella.
A lot of my grails atm are Titans Return/Takara Legends figures I missed at the time.

Tragic that I had to cut waaaay back on the hobby the same time my dream line was happening.

 

[Glitch]

Combining for the toys, I like having extra modes for voyager plus figures and 'super modes' where deluxes become limbs adds more for it. But for storytelling, I think there's still untapped potential from the headmaster gimmick, whether it's japan transtectors or US binary bonding, there's some good stuff there.

 

[Cybersnark]

Minicons (and Minicon-like partners).

Making every figure a two-pack helps keep the edge off the constantly-rising pricing.

 

[Haywire]

Targetmasters/Battlemasters--to my mind, most Transformers weapons should have their own robot mode. And many of those should be beasts, not strictly humanoid, such as Pteraxodon.

Binary combiners like in Energon. Yeah, the execution wasn't the greatest, but some of the combinations were decent. Inferno/Roadblock, Downshift, and Towline were all highlights of the gimmick, in my opinion.

 

[Princess Viola]

- Super modes
- Combiners
- Headmasters
- Targetmasters
- Triple-changers (at least in concept I like this gimmick, Transformers toys that triple change do often tend to just end up with one pretty good alt mode and one kind of meh alt mode, but when done right - it's done right)

 

[The Mighty Mollusk]

Transforming.

Considering Action Masters, RED, and all the other non-transforming sub-lines that have come and gone, yes, that counts.

 

[Plutoniumboss]

Headmasters and Combiners always get my attention. Minicons were at their absolute best when they had multiple kinds of integration with the larger figures, like Cyclonus's gear wheel gimmick, or Demolishor and Sideways having seats for their little guys. But one gimmick we've barely seen in Transformers? Symmetrical docking. Is there even a figure besides Animated Safeguard that does it?

 

[Sabrblade]

Headmasters and Combiners always get my attention. Minicons were at their absolute best when they had multiple kinds of integration with the larger figures, like Cyclonus's gear wheel gimmick, or Demolishor and Sideways having seats for their little guys. But one gimmick we've barely seen in Transformers? Symmetrical docking. Is there even a figure besides Animated Safeguard that does it?

 

[Princess Viola]

I mean that's the same toy three times.

 

[Plutoniumboss]

I am shamed.

 

[Sabrblade]

I mean that's the same toy three times.

Three times the toy, three times the fun!

 

[Haywire]

I mean that's the same toy three times.

...but one of them has a new hat!

 

[CoffeeHorse]

Minicons were at their absolute best when they had multiple kinds of integration with the larger figures, like Cyclonus's gear wheel gimmick, or Demolishor and Sideways having seats for their little guys.

The Decepticons just did Minicons better. The only Autobot to really capture that extra functionality the Decepticons had is Jetfire, which is interesting since other Jetfires tend to be former Decepticons.

 

[Haze Arquebus]

Super modes/combinations by far.

 

[CoffeeHorse]

Agreed. I didn't realize how much I like super modes and combinations until Primes stopped doing that. I just expected it.

 

[Superomegaprime]

Headmasters and Combiners always get my attention. Minicons were at their absolute best when they had multiple kinds of integration with the larger figures, like Cyclonus's gear wheel gimmick, or Demolishor and Sideways having seats for their little guys. But one gimmick we've barely seen in Transformers? Symmetrical docking. Is there even a figure besides Animated Safeguard that does it?

Its about the rarest form of combining, and to be honest, Animated Safeguard is not exactly very great, the seperate figures are desent but, combining them, is troublesome, due to the nature of the torsos, thou I wouldn't mind Hasbro using the Weaponizer gimmick as a means to try again, outside of Safeguard and Energon Omega, there not been a single Transformer that uses that means of combining, in the Transformers world, thou the earliest I'm aware of, is from the Brave series and its GaoGaiGar show, they had four bots capable of combining in that fashion, thou they are the same body with different paint jobs and arms!

 

[Future_Erika]

I do want to see more non-scramble city/"megazord" type combiners.
Like either the multi-bot kind of super modes(which the weaponizers are basically the universal DIY version of that), or dedicated 2-3 member teams that *really* focus on getting the proportions right.

Storywise I'm a sucker for "fusion" in general as a way to express the relationships between characters

 

[TheSupernova]

In order:

Super modes (PMOP was always my favourite toy as a kid!)
Combiners (always fun!)
Headmasters (I always liked the Transtector take on it)
Triple Changers (Better in theory than in practice?_