Ascendant Lords – Kingdom of Vzir
Classification: Melee
Armaments:
(1) PA-ALVZRSCY-XY
Along with the overhaul of his twin sister’s reFrame, Ran Al’ Vzir also had his previous Vzir’ Ran overhauled and updated.
The much improved Vzir’ Regis has all the functional upgrades done to the Vzir’ Regalia. Unlike his sister’s mech however, Monarch Ran instructed Court Engineers for a more conservative upgrade. One request was to specifically retain the imposing look with its wide shoulders and caped design. The PA-ALVZRSCY-XY Scythe is also only slightly modified from its previous iteration.
BUILD NOTES
This build, according to the lore, belongs to the twin brother of the monarch pilot of the Vzir’ Regalia. When I built both Vzir reFrames back in 2015, they were really meant to be a white / black, sister / brother, yin/yang tandem so I continued that concept for the rebuild versions.
Compared to the Regalia though, the modifications for the Vzir’ Regis (originally Vzir’ Ran) was conservative, retaining a huge section of the shoulder pauldrons and staying with the same Scythe weapon with only minor changes.
Design-wise, the Regalia and Regis were redesigned to be inverted shapes of one another. The Regalia was more of an A shape and the Regis was made to be a V shape, again to further drive the different characteristics of the pilot / monarch twins.
Inspiration and sources
A major inspiration for the original Vzir’ Ran build was the Hykelion (Hyukerion) from Broken Blade. (For spoiler reasons, I won’t say anything further about this mecha. 😅) Other inspirations for it was the Gundam Deathscythe (cape + scythe come on!), Virtual-On’s Specineff, a variety of Guymelefs from Escaflowne, and several Mortarr Heads from Five Star Stories. Also a bit of Banshee Gundam (especially for head).
Definitely wanted a royalty special mech feel and vibe to it with the black + gold color combo but still make it a nasty mecha, especially in close combat.
WIP Process
1. Head build
Like most builds, I started redesigning the head from the previous version. The Vzir’ Ran head design had this huge airplane tail sticking out in the middle and while I liked that, repeating it would make the head too wide and bulky.
The new head was meant to still be like a Japanese samurai helmet (kabuto) but differently designed from the Marzan faction’s Kurosawa series. I also wanted a golden crown design that was fitting for a ruler so I started experimenting with the new Ninjago weapons in pearl gold.
Initially, I only wanted a two horn crown look for the helmet but felt it wasn’t regal enough. I experimented on a more complex horned helmet design using a combination of the first two drafts.
The head is actually built in a similar structure as the Regalia’s design. The Nexo Knights shield tile serves as the jaw and a 1×1 trans. red plate is used for the eye piece. The Regis just has the neck joint connection positioned a plate higher, allowing the base of the head to sit nearer to the body and not have that weird gap beside the neck connector.
II. Upper Body
The body design is actually made very closely to the Regalia to give them shared design aspects. The arms here were more of an experimental build but the forearms ended up being a stud too long. Shoulders were intended to be very basic and had a more internal look as they would be covered by the shoulder armor.
You can see here that I’ve made connections for the shoulder armor connecting to the body instead of resting on the actual shoulder assembly. The original Vzir’ Ran (using the reFrame V1) actually had the shoulder armor connected to the shoulder but used the much bigger Technic ball joint that could support the weight.
Since the Vzir’ Regis uses the reFrame V3, I had to make sure the heavy shoulder armor didn’t attach to the actual shoulder. If it did, it would make the shoulder droop due to the weight.
III. Lower Body
Similar to the upper body, most of the lower body was designed to be very close to the Regalia. One major difference is where the huge curved pieces on the sides of the waist connect to. There’s also the lack of the large curved section for the front of the waist / crotch. The simple reason being I ran out of those parts T_T (Covid situation makes restocking locally / internationally very slow).
Legs side armor plating was much longer than the Regalia, almost touching the ankle. There’s also some differences in how the plating was done with the Regis having a more segmented / armored look.
Arms were rebuilt back to resemble the Regalia’s arms but with different side armor plating. Also some minor changes to the shoulder design as I started fleshing out the V shape of the Regis.
IV. Initial Design
Here I’m experimenting with a totally different shoulder design based off these Bionicle (thigh guard) pieces. These were chosen to really emphasize that V-shaping (mentioned in Build Notes). The red heat sinks were added mostly as a filler to the top of the shoulder as the Bionicle pieces left a gap.
The cape was reduced to just one from the original two due to the lack of connection points with this shoulder design. Scythe also had its initial minor modifications done.
Honestly I was quite torn at this point as I liked this new shoulder design but it departed too much from the original build. Asked a few local buddies of mine for some feedback and echoed the same thing (it’s great to have an honest group of friends 
). They also mentioned that the part of the legs and ankles looked too thin and could use some bulking up.
While I did like the shoulder + red vents, it just didn’t fit this build so it’ll definitely reappear in a future build. This is also stresses the importance of recording the WIPs of a build in case you make something that doesn’t quite work now but can be used for a future build.
V. Final Design
The final design had me go back to the original shoulder assembly. I ended up reducing it by a segment of the train track bumper piece (in black) to fit the current proportions better. The tricky part was how to get it to clip to the shoulder attachments (as seen in WIP II and III).
I wanted the recycled pauldrons to have more of a large overlapping mantle feel so extra black nexo shield tiles were added in front of the armpits.
Following the advice of my friends, I also buffed up the inner thigh and added ankle side guards to thicken the leg silhouette.
Notable Parts usage
I. Shoulder Brick
2991 Technic, Brick 1 x 2 – 1 x 2 Angled with Bumper Holder
This piece is usually used with a rubber bumper piece. It’s an interesting piece to use with the open studs, Technic pin holes, and angled section.
II. Wrist Crowns
39262 Minifigure, Headgear Crown with 5 Points, Open Center Stud
I believe this got introduced with the The LEGO Movie 2 sets. Usually I get multiple pieces of anything that is a hollow stud, especially if its one stud like this piece. And yes you can combine two of these to make an interesting spiky ball shape.
III. Capes!
12941 Hero Factory Cape, Large
This is actually from set 44000 Furno XL (Hero Factory) and is one of the larger capes you can get. I originally hunted these down for my mech chess King build in 2014-2015.
Commissions
If you’re curious about getting a custom reFrame from me, simply check out my Commissions section here in my website. I’ve written all the details you might need to order your own custom LEGO reFrame mech build and what kind of customization options you can get.
Do take note though that I only do this in a very limited capacity.
I open up slots for commissions here on my site and also announce it over at my various social media pages. I’d suggest following me on any/all of my social media pages below to stay updated on my work and commission slots.
reFRAME v3 Instruction Manual
The reFrame System is a modular brick skeleton aimed to help both new and veternan brick mech builders create their own designs in a consistent size with modular capabilities. It was originally designed to be a basis for all my mechs in the Mech Wars universe. Having gone through a number of upgrades, the V3 reFrame can now house a minifigure pilot in the chest without sacrificing aesthetic or articulation.
If you liked this article then you can help me out create more LEGO mech content by clicking the PayPal donate button below. Your monetary contribution, no matter how big or small, will definitely help me a lot in sustaining this passion 
wow, really almost pulls off the feeling of the grim reaper(if he was a samurai)! looks amazing, especially the head! i love the fact it looks more imposing than its sister reframe and look just ass if not more Badass! though im still waiting to see what you will do with the EWAC, you still made a beautiful build nonetheless. Amazing build!
P.S: i got around to starting my own reframe! wish me luck! 🙂
Good luck! 😁 And enjoy the build process! 👌👌👌
Thank you! 😁🙏 I’ve actually started writing down ideas for the EWAC build but not sure if I’ll do it for mechtober week 3 or save it for the very last week 😅
Good News, i finished my build! and its under going modification and improvements!
Wow. You’ve nailed it again, Messymaru. I don’t know what it is, probably the combo of the cape and the weapon, but it reminds me of Asgore. I don’t really know why. I’ve wondered what the cape was, and now I know how to get my hands on it. This is probably one of my favorite mechs you’ve done yet.
😁 Thank you! Yeah got a ton of questions about that cape even when I made the first version. It’s quite expensive to get if I remember correctly from its Bricklink price so you may want to consider just getting the set for it if you can find it cheap enough. There’s also newer (bigger?) capes from the Star Wars constraction buildable figures.
i would buy plans for this in a heart beat, this is so cool!!!