[SOLVED] How did Hex - Arena Shooter use custom Player.Character models?

I would like the players in my own game to take on the appearance of some models I have built in keeping with the theme of the game. I can't make the Player/Character take on the appearance of the models. Whenever I parent the Humanoid object from the player into the model, my player dies.

With this LocalScript, my player lands dead

function loadModel(model)
    local clone = game.ServerStorage:FindFirstChild(model):Clone()
    clone.Parent = workspace
    clone:MakeJoints()
end

loadModel("Robot")

local player = game.Players.LocalPlayer
local character = player.Character or player.CharacterAdded:wait()
local humanoid = character:FindFirstChild("Humanoid")
humanoid.Parent = game.Workspace.Robot

I've also learned that

character:Destroy()

kills my player.

I'm beginning to think I need to clear the players of their appearance and then just stick them inside the coordinates of another model, but this seems lame and doesn't account for animations, etc...

Another user had a similar question over here but it doesn't seem to be getting any attention.