Rhodes81

Eurobricks Vassals
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About Rhodes81

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    Atlanta, Ga

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  1. Rhodes81

    Nexo Knights 2016

    Obviously not what traditional castle fans were hoping for, but this line looks absolutely fantastic for Sci-fi and Star Wars mocers and maybe at least a few parts will be useful for Castle. Most castle fans are strictly mocers anyway, so it's the pieces that matter, not the sets.
  2. Rhodes81

    New lego discount strategy

    Every retail company tries things like this whenever they have a new product or promotion along those lines. For instance, fast-food restaurants test new menu items in certain markets sometimes over a year before deciding if they will make it available in other markets.These test markets are chosen very strategically, Generally, a company will put their new product in the market where they expect it to perform the worst, and then if it does well enough to survive in the worst market, they know they can roll it out in the others. They will also test in some other markets, but it is the worst market that they are most interested to see. The purpose of this particular promotion is likely to move out a product that they will no longer have shelf space for. Since this is a test, that doesn't mean it is necessarily the pirates chess set in particular that they need to move, but rather that they simply identified a set which they had an excess supply of and wanted to see how drastically its sales would increase.
  3. These days, I mostly buy used sets off ebay, build them, and then sell them back off. The only exceptions are the architecture sets, which I like to keep and display. I also keep a small army of custom Star Wars minifigs and my castle armies, but these are usually just kept in a box. All of my LEGO is kept in the basement as that's the only place where I have a free table to build, and the only other things down there are a bunch of unused furniture and a bar, mini-fridge, and an air hockey table (my mother-in-law is very anti-alcohol, so we keep it downstairs rather than hide it whenever she comes) so the only people that generally see it are friends that have known me and know I like LEGO for a long time, so I don't get a whole lot of comments on there other than the occasional "Your army has gotten bigger!" I do keep my most recent architecture purchase sitting on my desk in the study, which sees a bit more visitors. I normally get something along the lines of "That's neat" with a varying degree of interest. Some people really like it or comment that it's cool that there are "Adult LEGO sets." I've never gotten any childish comments, but that could be due to the nature of the sets on display. There's also a lot of competition considering I'm a book collector and a rabid sports fan, so there's a lot of other things to look at in there.
  4. Rhodes81

    Nexo Knights 2016

    I haven't posted in a long time, but decided to log in for this one. I know we would all love to have a line of Medieval themed sets that are as quality as the UCS Star Wars sets, but that simply isn't realistic. Star Wars has a much wider appeal to both kids and adults than Medieval, and there is more room for the Star Wars line in Lego's product list than there is for castle themes. This requires too much of TLGs Medieval design space to be the same type of castle sets we have seen over and over again because Lego needs those sets to reach the demographics that do care about history. This is good news because it means TLG will continue to put out some kind of history related sets every 2-3 years to make sure they don't miss any of these potential life-long fans (because 2-3 years can be the difference between missing and not missing a lot of children), but it also means that we will continue to see fairly unoriginal designs for this theme because TLG is going for mass appeal. Kids can't collect Lego for 5+ years like adults can. Kids can't buy sets from 10 years ago to fill a void in their collection, so TLG has to keep producing the basic king's castle, evils person's jail, siege tower, etc so the KFOLs can get them. Realistically, most other themes have the same problem, but some of them tend to have a higher percentage of the Lego product list, and thus have more AFOL targeted sets because they simply have more sets in general. This is just a reality of being a fan of the historic theme. AS far as this relates to Nexo Knights, the theme will be a Chima/Ninjago theme if Lego believes that demographic won't be over-saturated, and it will be a Medieval/castle theme if Lego believes that market won't be oversaturated. It all depends on how large TLG believes those two markets are, and how often is too often to create a line of sets for those markets. TLG is an international company with thousands of employees, and is in a better position to make these judgments than we are. The reality is that fans of castle themes are a small subset of Lego fans, and that AFOL history fans are an even further subset, and while they may be the majority on this board, AFOLs that are fans of specifically realistic history sets are an even further subset. Lego clearly sees Ninjago/Chima to give the castle theme greater mass appeal, and so if Nexo knights is similar to these two, that means it is Lego attempting to keep castle relevant while also boosting sales. While it's not what I'm happy to see, it is better than if Lego simply didn't produce any castle related sets this year. Just hope we get some decent pieces to use and take solace knowing that it won't be too long before we get another castle theme.
  5. Rhodes81

    How many factions in your kingdom?

    my main faction is the lion kinghts from the current wave they are in alliance with a custom faction of mercenaries next i have a faction of undead soldiers in alliance with the crown knights then there's the current dragon knights along with what i call their reserve guard (aka the old black knights). so i guess that's three main groups that can each be divided into two factions.
  6. Rhodes81

    POTC - Black Pearl!

    as someone who understands that this is supposed to be more of something for kids to play with and less of an actual accurate model of the ship i like it. could it be more accurate? sure. could it be bigger? sure. but c'mon people, it's 80 bucks and it's for children. they new so many kids would want it just because it's called the black pearl that they had to make it less expensive so more parents of the little buggers would be willing to buy it. unfortunately for those of us that are used to having these beautiful ships we made ourselves with space for dozens of minifigs that means they had to skimp a bit on size and detail. the fact is, just like with star wars, castle, and every other theme, no official set will ever come close to what serious adult collectors can design and build themselves because, for the most part, they're all made for children and have to be able to be put together and played with by children. personally i'll probably buy one and then pick up another one without the figs on ebay and use the extra parts to extend it and add a bit of detail. that'll be plenty good enough for me.
  7. Rhodes81

    What's your latest acquisition?

    picked up 6057 off ebay. nice little boat.
  8. Rhodes81

    Rise to the Wicked

    haha yeah nothing like this forum to make your building skills seem incredibly inadequate
  9. Rhodes81

    Future Star Wars Minifigs

    which stinks, because in my opinion that set didn't sell well because it wasn't a good set, not because of it being the EU
  10. Rhodes81

    [MOC] Boba Fett's Mech I

    i love it. i've gotta start making some gundam and zoids inspired mocs.
  11. Rhodes81

    Future Star Wars Minifigs

    i hate that the expanded universe sets didn't sell well. now we're never going to get a mara jade figure. any of the solo kids, ben, jag fel, etc would be instant buys for me no matter what set they were in. also i know there are ridiculously expensive third party options, but i'd love some official releases of delta and omega squads. those could make nice battle packs.
  12. Rhodes81

    Rise to the Wicked

    the dragons and wyverns are beautiful, and i love how all the sets have functions without looking gimmicky like lego has done a lot of lately. i also LOVE some of the color schemes. i never understood why brickforge made medieval stuff in that sand green color until now.
  13. Rhodes81

    POTC - Black Pearl!

    do we really have to be that specific? i still think it's better than most say it is.
  14. Rhodes81

    POTC - Black Pearl!

    i agree with the idea that expectations were too high. the black pearl in the movies is actually rather unimpressive looking compared to some of the other main ships. a ucs flying dutchman makes more sense because there's a lot more detail that can be put into it, like the rotating guns on the front and the fact that it has more texture and color to it than the pearl. if you didn't expect this thing to rival the ifs then you aren't disappointed. if you did, you are. i think it's that simple. if lego makes a ucs flying dutchman everyone will forgive them. especially seeing as this set apparently should give us some helpful pieces for making a more detailed moc of the pearl along with some great figs.
  15. Rhodes81

    Star Wars sets anyone?

    good that they're finally getting here but i think i'll wait for target to get them and see what the prices are. is the republic frigate a tru exclusive? if not that's what my money is going for. i also want the ewoks and that red protocol droid but i'll just ebay him.