Maximal Elder

The Maximal Elders are the leaders of Cybertron during the Beast Wars era of the Generation 1 continuity family.

Robes: because even robots get cold, sometimes.

The Maximal High Council of Elders, or just Maximal Elders, are the Maximals who lead the political and military fronts from planet Cybertron following the conclusion of the Great War. They allow the Predacons certain individual freedoms as their own faction, though in reality, they must answer to the Maximal Elders. The Maximal Elders aren't all sugar and rainbows, however, as they have greenlit several experiments of questionable ethics.

(How the Council of Elders relates to the Maximal Imperium remain to be seen.)

Japanese Name: Convoy Council or Council of Convoys

Fiction

Beast Wars cartoon

Not much is known about the Maximal Elders, including who the members are and how many exist. The Tripredacus Council is accused of kissing their skid-plates. They apparently keep a tight hold on any and all information regarding the Great War and Earth, restricting access to it from the general populace. (The Predacons conversely have no such restrictions.) They have also made the area of space around planet Earth off limits, for unknown reasons. The Elders also authorized the experimental Protoform X, and later its disposal.

Beast Wars Neo cartoon

The Maximal Elders were shown as the supreme ruling body of the Maximal faction, communing with Vector Sigma and giving orders to Generals of a Convoy ranking. The Maximal Elders assigned Big Convoy with the task of training a fresh batch of new recruits. Big Convoy was notoriously anti-social and a bit of a psycho. The Maximal Elders believed that by surrounding him with rowdy youngsters, Big Convoy might learn how to make friends. Big Convoy, Move Out

During an adventure on the planet Godbless, the power of an Angolmois capsule, amplified by Saberback's black magic, caused whoever approached it to see the god of their choice. The Maximals began to hallucinate seeing a gigantic Maximal Elder which warded them away. They eventually overcame their fear, defeated the vision and secured the capsule. Chase the Mysterious Capsule

When Unicron was reborn, he made his way back to Cybertron to settle an old score with the planet. Great Convoy, a member of the Maximal Elders, led a Maximal armada of hundreds of warships against the Chaos God. However, they were all instantly destroyed by Unicron's fiery serpent-mode and Great Convoy was killed in the battle. The fate of the other Maximal Elders is unknown. Unicron's Ambition

Beast Machines cartoon

Sometime after conquering all of Cybertron with his Vehicon army and transformation virus, Megatron moved into the Council Citadel in the planetary capital of Cybertropolis, which had previously served as the capitol of the Maximal Elders.

3H comics

Apelinq noted with disdain that, in the wake of the attacks that signaled the beginning of Megatron's conquest of Cybertron, the Maximal Elders at first attempted to ignore the problem, but as it became clear that the attacks were not simply random, isolated incidents, they became "all but immobilized, with blame and doubt being cast from one end of the command chain to another".

Additional notes

Many fans assumed that Magnaboss might've filled the same role for the Maximals that the Tripredacus Council performed for the Predacons. Its three components' Generation 1-inspired names implies to some that these are the original Autobots in advisory roles. Indeed, in the Universe comics, Magnaboss was depicted as a member of the Maximal High Council, among others, after the reformatting of Cybertron. The IDW Beast Wars comic establish that the Magnaboss trio compose the Maximal Imperium, but its relation to the elders is unclear.