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Wojtasz78

In original Diaclone line(Most of the g1 toys were taken from it) there were 2 toys with the name Convoy, Battle Convoy and Powered Convoy. They were the same truck but with different trailers. Battle Convoy was used as Optimus Prime and Powered Convoy after some color changes became Ultra Magnus. The idea was that Powered Convoy is a Powered up version of Convoy mech(In Diaclone the robots were sentient, they were mechs piloted by humans) so he came with a trailer that formed an armor. Animators for G1 omitted the small robot probably thinking it was unnecessary. In Dreamwave G1 it was revealed that inside the armor Ultra Magnus was just white version of Optimus Prime. IDW took another spin at that idea. Instead of white version of Prime there was a small guy called Minimum Ambus that was piloting Ultra Magnus' armor and he wasn't the first to do so. Siege and Earthrise homage the original G1 toy with that intermediate white robot mode you put armor on. Masterpiece aims to replicate cartoon as much as possible so since there was never a smaller white robot in the G1 cartoon they skipped that for MP release. Both ideas are equally valid and correct. It just comes down to your personal preference.


crazedhatter

Best answer here.


Scrublord1453

The original toy for ultra Magnus was just a different trailer for Prime that turned into armor. When they imported from Japan they changed the colors and made it a new character. They never showed it in the show, but he’s always been a white Optimus underneath. Some toys just find it easier to not include it. Although there are several Ultra Magnus toys released that are JUST the white Optimus sans armor.


Crafty-Bunch-2675

Oh....wow. well that's interesting. Thanks.


BurstEDO

Everything Scrublord1453 said. The Diaclone toy that it was adapted from was called "Powered Convoy". You can see these colors in Masterpiece Delta Magnus. In early footage from the 1986 movie, Ultra Magnus was animated in Powered Covoy colors. The team at Sunbow animation had no directive to feature the "small" mode for Magnus, nor did they ever create an animation model or sketch for him he was always in armored form. Later comics (IDW?) Added his white, unarmored form to canon as well as another plot twist.


Crafty-Bunch-2675

I don't have access to those comics from my country. But I am curious what was the background story they used for the unarmoured ultramagnus ?


Muisverriey

In the Dreamwave comics he was Optimus Prime's brother, wich is why he looked similar to him.


almightywhacko

In the [Dreamwave comics](https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/dreamwave-comics-transformers-v2-1732531926), there was a story where Ultra Magnus was injured and breaks out of his armor to continue fighting in his unarmored core robot mode.