Brickbeard's Bounty better than Queen Anne's Revenge?

[WesternOutlaw]

Interesting comparison. I own both ships but I think the QA beats BB. What does it for me is the colors of the QA. The sails are beautiful with the dark red/crimson color. I also like the rear of the QA with its large lantern and other smaller lanterns. For me, it's not so much about playability but collectibility. I've got my QA on the fireplace mantle and really enjoy looking at it often.

[Runamuck]

I have both ships, so maybe I could take a little look on what advantages and disadvantages both ships have.

First let’s start with tossing realism aside for a bit as neither the LEGO Pirates line or Pirates of the Caribbean were ever truly aiming to be realistic.

Advantages:

Brickbeard’s Bounty:

The cabin doe actually have doors, which in my book is a good thing. The cabin is also pretty roomie and easily accessible which is good for play.

Both masts actually have rope ladders (sorry I know very little of ship-terminology), which makes the masts a bit more stable.

The cannons are better. Two of the have proper wheels, and I think that the cannon on the turntable at the back is a really fun feature which gives more aiming opportunities than your average cannon.

For piratey bits that aren’t strictly necessary it also has a treasure and a plank. The ship also has some smaller guns on the front and is therefore as an unmodified set better armed. There are also a lot of animals, parrot, monkey and a really neat shark.

Queen Anne’s Revenge:

In most ways it is bigger. The piece count is actually the second highest of all the LEGO pirates related ships. It also has more sails.

The figures are better as an actual crew for the ship. All the figures present on the ship were part of the crew (although not by volunteering for it). It also has more unique figures. It has 3 figures that aren’t present in other sets (the cook, Angelika and the quartermaster) where the Bounty only has one (the girl).

The ship actually has an anchor.

The cabin interior is well above average, although since the average is somewhere between a single table and nothing at all that isn’t saying too much.

The system that holds up the sails is way better than that on the Bounty. These sails don’t slide around, and the pieces holding the do not bend as easily. The sails themselves are also a bit better. Both ships have sails that are only printed on one side, but this is a lot less notable on the Revenge as they are dark red and not white. In particular the triangular sails look a lot better (personally I don’t mind the skulls on Brickbeard’s sails too much).

Disadvantages:

Brickbeard’s bounty:

As mentioned before I don’t like how the sails are held up and the white backside of the sails.

It has no anchor.

You could complain about the figures. While it is nice that they packed a conflict into the set complete with soldiers and hostage it unfortunately leaves the ship with only half a crew.

Queen Anne’s Revenge:

The cabin has no door. This annoys me particularly as it was a plot point in the movie that Blackbeard was hiding in the cabin. It is hard to hide when there are no doors on it. The cabin is also rather tiny.

The cannon system is as bare bones as it gets. The holes to aim through are really really small. Compared to other ships it is also missing a cannon to fill out a full broadside.

Only one mast has rope ladders holding it in place.

Compared to older ships it looks a bit odd that there aren’t flags on all the masts.

I think that both ships pull of their looks pretty well, although they have very different esthetic goals.

I’m in general terrible at choosing favorites, and I can’t really do it here either, I really like both ships.

[Captain Fortune]

BB is so much better than QAR.

In fact, I think that QAR has got lots of deficiencies.

[CaptainBermuda]

the QAR certainly is much bigger and has more guns.....but, I do kind of prefer quality over quantity, which when trying to stay in a reasonable price range is difficult to combine the two, so I woudl have to go with the BB

[Duck]

I only have one of the two (and its a very recent purchase) so I'm going to be a bit biased on this one when I lean more towards QAR.

However, I think the two are difficult to compare. BB is more cartoon-pirate looking while QAR is more gritty nasty pirate looking. I'd say QAR is slightly more realistic looking as a result but obviously its still not going to win any competitions for realism! So really, I do think it just comes down to personal choice as to what you want your pirates to be - cartoony or rough and ready!

[Ben King]

This is a difficult subject. All of you have good points. I think I like the QAR better, though. I like the colors better, the dark red with black and dark brown looks very nice. Also the sail plan is nicer. I'm not basing any of this on historical accuracy because I'm not a complete expert on ships like many of the other members here.

[Captain Settle]

QAR has 12 pockets, so it could have 6 or 12 cannons...but it has only 3...too bad.

at least with more cannon ports you can add more cannons.