21305 Maze as a basis for a Modular MOC

[finnbricker]

When the Maze passed the Lego Ideas review, I was not very interested. While familiar with such mazes from my childhood, they were never my favourite toys and I couldn’t see myself buying and building a Lego version.

But the baseplate changed it all. Well, sort of. I’m still not interested in the Maze as a maze, but my interest of the set as a parts pack is growing all the time. The set has 769 pieces, one of which is a dark stone grey 32x32 baseplate, which is something you very rarely see in sets nowadays, and in a useful colour, too. What’s more, the 768 remaining pieces seem to include a whole lot of 1x basic bricks in good colours (tan, medium stone grey, black) and lots of tiles and big plates. The set retails for $70 in the US, probably €70 in Europe. The PPP is 9,1 cents, which is not too bad, and it gets even better if you value the baseplate at $/€8 – the PPP for the remaining parts is only 8,07 cents.

So what I’m thinking now is to challenge myself, and hopefully others too: Let’s convert 21305 Maze into a modular building! We’ve got the baseplate, we’ve got a whole lot of tan bricks plus other colours for details, we’ve got tiles to top off the floors and we’ve got plates to build ceilings/floors. What we miss are windows, doors and, partially, some small details around the windows.

What do you think? We don’t have a parts list yet, but based on the images released, do you think 21305 would be a valuable parts pack for a modular MOC?

[tkatt]

I think you're right that this could be a very good parts pack, but until the parts list comes out it's hard to say what percentage of the parts would be useful for a modular building.

I'd guess that there could be at least 100 technic parts inside the maze, which try as I might I can rarely use them in modular MOC. I also expect that the bricks hidden in the interior will be bright primary colors. My estimate is that about 600 of the parts would work for me.

I'd buy it for sure at $40, but it would have to sell very poorly for it to be discounted that much. Is it wrong to hope that the set is a failure in the stores?

[Paperballpark]

How about using it as a base for a modular 'earthquake-proof buildings testing rig'? :)

Shake them around on it and see whether they fall apart!

[Actor Builder]

Is it wrong to hope that the set is a failure in the stores?

No, but it would be wrong to sabotage the sales records to make them drop the price.

[hadidi1999]

How about using it as a base for a modular 'earthquake-proof buildings testing rig'? :)

Shake them around on it and see whether they fall apart!

I was actually thinking of building some sort of 3-7 story modular and you start from the top, and roll all the way down as you escape 'THE FIRE'.

[finnbricker]

Tkatt, I'm afraid you could be right about the big number of useless Technic parts. Brickset just added a review of the Maze, http://brickset.com/article/19895/review-21305-maze, and indeed it does seem that the number of basic 1x bricks is smaller than I had hoped for. But I haven't given up hope just yet. And there are more black roof tiles than I thought, they will work nicely as façade details.

The baseplate is not dark stone grey like I thought, but medium stone grey. Which is okay, too.

[finnbricker]

The parts list is now available online here: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=123632 There are 118 Technic pieces that are practically useless for Modular houses.

[tafkatb]

Technic pieces that are practically useless

Challenge accepted.