[EMS] Upper Charge & Leap Attack

After a bit of delay, EMS released two new skills for Hero's toolkit. Introducing Upper Charge and Leap Attack, a pair of powerful skills that's significant enough to warrant its own dedicated blogpost. Originally released shortly after the Rise update in KMS, Nexon decided to postpone this patch for several additional months so they could include these with our edition of the Awake update instead. To say the wait was painful is an understatement, but at least the Celestial Festival and Mark of Honor III events were nice distractions and gave out some great rewards.

So, basically: Upper Charge and Leap Attack are here to improve Hero's movement options, allowing us to perform a multitude of new ways to tackle platforming and dodge boss attacks. While these skills are shared with Paladin and Dark Knight, as usual I will only focus on the in-depth applications with Hero.

[EMS] Sword Illusion - Level 30!

Sup guys! Today saw the release of the Awake update, which in old EMS tradition is a combination of several updates combined. Basically, we got a huge backlog of new skills, skill adjustments and upcoming content all at once. 

So, there's a bunch of new stuff to write about, and the following is my planned schedule for EMS-related blogposts:

• Near the end of the month, I'm expecting to publish a blogpost covering the new Upper Charge and Leap Attack skills, which are new movement options for Hero with a surprising amount of utilization.
• In mid-December, I'll cover our newest 5th Job skill, Sword Illusion, together with the other skill adjustments. The usual stuff (example).
• Maybe I'll write about the upcoming changes to the Amaterasu item set in January, if I feel like it...

Obviously, I'm still working on that Xenoblade Definitive Edition article, so the progress on it will have to happen at the same time as these EMS blogposts (and any work on the Hailfire Droid, at that). I took a (much-needed) break on the DE's article for about two weeks, but I'm ready to pick it up again tomorrow. There's just so much stuff to cover there, and I've been working on it actively for the past six months - it's kinda difficult to maintain a consistent productivity when it's such an undertaking.

Anyway, that's it for today - I'll see you guys again next post!

[Lego] Mokarr's head

A literal piece of LEGO^® history, from an unreleased Galidor set.

Well then. This is significant and something special.

Long story short: in 2002, LEGO^® released a theme called Galidor with officially 20 announced sets. Set #8322, named "Mokarr" (occasionally misspelled as "Makarr") was unreleased, despite being advertised on various media as an upcoming product. The set itself is a motorbike with a shark motif, a complementary vehicle for other Galidor figures, similar to the TDN Module.

Initially, little to no additional information could be found about this set. It was shrouded in mystery, with a bunch of "supposedly there are" and "apparently there is", but as time went on, additional information became more concrete: Mokarr is real, and so are other unreleased Galidor sets.

Look at that printed gum and teeth! The details on this thing are awesome.

Despite being unreleased and never mass produced, LEGO^® did produce a very small number of Mokarr's and other (unreleased) Galidor products that were part of (supposedly) future releases. Basically, they had the injection molds and the pad printer ready, used it to produce parts for their own archives, and it seems that some of these parts ended up on the aftermarket. From the perspective of an engineer, the term "prototype" for these parts is misleading.

In contrast, the top of the head is smooth and has some nice depth to it. It looks like a squid?

In 2018, supposedly a complete Mokarr was sold on Bricklink, to the frustration of many (including myself). A few months ago I found the original seller by pure coincidence, and he confirmed that he sold another Mokarr earlier this year (yes, he had another one) to someone in the UK. To confirm that he wasn't pulling my leg, he sent me a picture album of the other Mokarr, which is different from the one sold in 2018 - this "2020 Mokarr" contains one piece in a different color, and it is exclusive to Mokarr. Suffice to say, the conversation was very informative.

Seeing as I missed out on a Mokarr twice, I felt gutted ("you snooze, you lose"). There aren't many out there in the wild. That may have been my last shot at ever finding one that's for sale. I've been in pursuit of this thing for over a decade. I could literally become a LEGO^® Product Designer, and that still doesn't mean I can have one. I can't really put it into words how important this set is to me, despite it ultimately being a silly plastic toy from long ago.

However, there is a silver lining in all of this.

The windscreen element is only used once per set, but heck: I have two of them.

The seller still had a couple of Mokarr parts for sale. Yes, it technically speaking is only three of eighteen parts, but at this point, I might as well take whatever I can get my hands on. It's that, or nothing - an easy decision to make.

So, while it may not be the full model, it's a step in the right direction. To be honest, I still find it very hard to believe I actually have something, given that Galidor ended 18 years ago. While it will always remain highly unlikely that I'll ever find the other Mokarr pieces or complete models for sale... the hunt, my pursuit of Mokarr, continues.

Edit on the 27th of June, 2021: Part 2.