Virginia_Bricks Posted January 26 Posted January 26 4 minutes ago, BrickBob Studpants said: Yeah, a shelf life of just two years for a D2C set is crazy!! That used to be the shelf life of regular sets! But with yearly D2C sets, it‘s not really that much of a surprise considering limited space on shelves and production capacity. I should have just bought Gringotts during Back to Hogwarts. I had budgeted for it but was buying other sets during that time and told myself to wait till Insiders Weekend and 2x points. But I stopped staying up to midnight to buy sets on release (though I might now with Minas Tirith not to risk it) because typically GWPs don't sell out that quick. I've learned my lesson on D2C sales though typically I don't wait till they are near EOL. Last year was just my second back as an AFOL so wasn't even thinking about Gringotts when it released. Quote
brickbride Posted January 27 Posted January 27 (edited) 10 hours ago, Black Falcon said: Which sets are you referring to? To keep on topic, one of them's the Borgin and Burke's GWP. It has a single reused fig, 190 pieces, let's say a list price of EUR 15 and that's already being very generous given actual EUR 15 sets like the Ford Anglia or the recent Sorting Ceremony. (LEGO list it at EUR 20 but come on.) At a list price of EUR 15 and the usual retail discounts I would buy it; I don't need it and I'm not sure where it would even fit but I like both Lucius and and Knockturn Alley. ;-) However, the only way to get it was to buy EUR 130 worth of HP sets on one specific September 1 when a) I had no time to go LEGO shopping and b) there was absolutely nothing I would have wanted to buy (my interest in HP mostly runs towards older sets), and the GWP is now usually listed for like EUR 50 plus shipping on my country's second-hand pages. (Germans are really very fortunate here due to the sheer size of their country and the number of listings, but I'm not German and international shipping adds up quickly if you can even find a seller that would undertake it.) So yes, I could absolutely get the set if I wanted to pay EUR 55 or more. For a very small, quick build with a single reused fig that other people got for free, that I don't need and don't really know where to put. And I'd probably feel bad even opening the box given how much money I'd just wasted. On the other hand I could take that EUR 55 and buy lots of other things, including LEGO sets I would get more enjoyment out of. So I'll pass. That's what I mean about LEGO making it hard to get their sets. Or at least it's one part of it. There's all the LEGO store exclusives - my country has a whopping two LEGO stores, both of which are hundreds of kilometers away. There's LEGO House exclusives. LEGO airport store exclusives! There's the LEGO online store which from what I hear lists quite a few sets that are supposed to be in production but in reality sold out, so even if you manage to order one they might just cancel your order. There's all the retailer exclusives. There's GWPs for specific amounts spent. There's GWPs for specific amounts spent on specific themes. There's even more specific GWPs only available with a single set and often sold out immediately. I know a German LEGO forum where a lot of people are talking about staying up till 1 am, snagging one of these exclusive GWPs, then selling it off immediately (whether they like the GWP itself or not) so they'll have gotten the main set at a price they can somewhat justify. That's absurd if you think about it - I can't even think of any other company, toy company or not, that does business like that - but perfectly normal in today's LEGO circles. Edited January 27 by brickbride Quote
Roebuck Posted January 27 Posted January 27 The hole point with GWP is to make you buy the qualifying sets for full price at Lego. If you instead wait for them to be discounted somewhere else Lego have sold them the set for around half the price first so they earn a lot less. There are so many GWP now during a year so my best advice is just to ignore most of them. A few I have on the nice to have list if I manage to combine them with a PAB order, swap them with someone else or buy them cheap that is fine or else I am missing out on them. And then there are 0 to maybe 1 a year I need to have that I will bite the bullet and order from Lego if there is no other option (I never buy them for crazy prizes in the after marked).. There are very few sets that are exclusive like the Lego house sets and they should not be hard to come by in Europe even if you do not take the trip to Billund.. The more you can avoid FEMO the happier you will be in your Lego collecting Quote
brickbride Posted January 27 Posted January 27 (edited) Yes, that's how I handle it. But a lot of people don't seem to, and publicly stress about what to buy for the latest GWP, or how much it sucks that another, better GWP comes along just after you've spent so much for the last GWP. Some of them seem to lose even track of how much money they're really spending and refer to what I would call significant purchases as "filler items" (i.e. "My cart only has EUR 130 and the treshold is EUR 250, I need to come up with a bunch of filler items. Any ideas?") Or they actually like a GWP they've gotten but can't justify keeping or even opening it because of the resale value. Or they brag in forums about how much they've sold it for to someone else. It just seems to suck a lot of joy out of the hobby, and to stress a lot of people out in different ways. Edited January 27 by brickbride Quote
Virginia_Bricks Posted January 27 Posted January 27 2 hours ago, brickbride said: Yes, that's how I handle it. But a lot of people don't seem to, and publicly stress about what to buy for the latest GWP, or how much it sucks that another, better GWP comes along just after you've spent so much for the last GWP. Some of them seem to lose even track of how much money they're really spending and refer to what I would call significant purchases as "filler items" (i.e. "My cart only has EUR 130 and the treshold is EUR 250, I need to come up with a bunch of filler items. Any ideas?") Or they actually like a GWP they've gotten but can't justify keeping or even opening it because of the resale value. Or they brag in forums about how much they've sold it for to someone else. It just seems to suck a lot of joy out of the hobby, and to stress a lot of people out in different ways. But for some people the hobby is Lego being a toy and a collectible, not just a toy. You might not interact with it that way, but plenty of people do. I mean look at Funko Pops, Pokemon Cards, Hot Wheels, and so many more toy brands. Be thankful grading and protective sleeves have so far stayed away from Lego. For some people the collecting brings as much as joy as the building. Or as a hobby it could be even worse like concert tickets or other limited release drops where you have to be on at that time and the secondary market is even more insane. Sure Lego and their marketing tactics take a little while to learn if you are trying to maximize your budget, but they are predictable. I prefer to buy directly from Lego because in the US its not uncommon for someone to return a set with the mini-figures or key pieces missing. Therefore, I know to save my Star Wars purchases for May and its promo season, Harry Potter for September, and most everything else for a 2x points event which happen 4 times a year unless I'm buy a D2C on release. I'm a planner by default so this is the way I would handle it even without the promos. I also just accept I can't buy every set I want so if I miss a promo I like, I'm confident down the road another one I will like will show up. Quote
BrickBob Studpants Posted January 27 Posted January 27 3 hours ago, brickbride said: "My cart only has EUR 130 and the treshold is EUR 250, I need to come up with a bunch of filler items. Any ideas?" I‘m in this picture and I don‘t like it Or rather, used to be. It happened a few times where I was really struggling to find sets to meet a GWP threshold because I already got all the sets I wanted! So nowadays, I purposefully only get the sets I care about the absolute most on day 1, and the rest (Botanicals, unlicensed Icons sets, Ninjago, Lunar New Year, Dreamzzz) serve as GWP threshold filler Don‘t get me wrong, I still genuinely want those sets, they‘re not just filler Luckily, pre-orders count again since late last year! Quote
Virginia_Bricks Posted January 27 Posted January 27 Really happy I bought Gringotts last night. The seller I purchased from raised prices 10% this morning after 45 sold yesterday (of their 75 in stock). With a lot of the first round of D2Cs from the reboot going end of life, it is interesting to see secondary market prices. I always thought Harry Potter was pretty affordable to buy used and after retirement, but the current average Bricklink listings for NIB retired D2Cs are: Diagon Alley: $520 (one seller has 490 of them at $460) Gringotts: $390 (one seller has 480 of them at $385) Hogwarts Express: $600 Quote
Black Falcon Posted January 28 Posted January 28 On 1/26/2026 at 8:38 PM, BrickBob Studpants said: Yeah, a shelf life of just two years for a D2C set is crazy!! That used to be the shelf life of regular sets! But with yearly D2C sets, it‘s not really that much of a surprise considering limited space on shelves and production capacity. Regular Sets often have even shorter shelf lifes, though and in the end it depends on sales and such, there are so many big sets now, you can´t keep everything for years in production. On 1/26/2026 at 8:45 PM, Virginia_Bricks said: I should have just bought Gringotts during Back to Hogwarts. I had budgeted for it but was buying other sets during that time and told myself to wait till Insiders Weekend and 2x points. But I stopped staying up to midnight to buy sets on release (though I might now with Minas Tirith not to risk it) because typically GWPs don't sell out that quick. I've learned my lesson on D2C sales though typically I don't wait till they are near EOL. Last year was just my second back as an AFOL so wasn't even thinking about Gringotts when it released. At least some GWPs exclusive to a certain Set have sold out quickly, Minas Tirith will probably be among them. Gringotts wasn´t avaiable in the US for Insiders weekend? On 1/27/2026 at 6:12 AM, brickbride said: To keep on topic, one of them's the Borgin and Burke's GWP. It has a single reused fig, 190 pieces, let's say a list price of EUR 15 and that's already being very generous given actual EUR 15 sets like the Ford Anglia or the recent Sorting Ceremony. (LEGO list it at EUR 20 but come on.) At a list price of EUR 15 and the usual retail discounts I would buy it; I don't need it and I'm not sure where it would even fit but I like both Lucius and and Knockturn Alley. ;-) However, the only way to get it was to buy EUR 130 worth of HP sets on one specific September 1 when a) I had no time to go LEGO shopping and b) there was absolutely nothing I would have wanted to buy (my interest in HP mostly runs towards older sets), and the GWP is now usually listed for like EUR 50 plus shipping on my country's second-hand pages. (Germans are really very fortunate here due to the sheer size of their country and the number of listings, but I'm not German and international shipping adds up quickly if you can even find a seller that would undertake it.) Well, yeah, GWPs are only avaiable for a short time, but aside from Sets that are exclusive to a Set I don´t remember any that was gone that fast lately. But aside from that you also mentioned normal Sets you would have bought and I just don´t think that any Set really was sold out all the time - closest to this is probably the Gingerbread AT-AT but even that one was avaiable for more than just a few days. On 1/27/2026 at 6:12 AM, brickbride said: That's what I mean about LEGO making it hard to get their sets. Or at least it's one part of it. There's all the LEGO store exclusives - my country has a whopping two LEGO stores, both of which are hundreds of kilometers away. There's LEGO House exclusives. LEGO airport store exclusives! There's the LEGO online store which from what I hear lists quite a few sets that are supposed to be in production but in reality sold out, so even if you manage to order one they might just cancel your order. There's all the retailer exclusives. Aside from BAM and certain GWPs (Usually when a Store opens) I don´t remember any Set that is exclusive to the Stores and retailer exclusives can still be bought at Lego, so it isn´t really like you couldn´t get your hands on those, but sure, not everyone probably knows that they even exist. On 1/27/2026 at 6:12 AM, brickbride said: There's GWPs for specific amounts spent. There's GWPs for specific amounts spent on specific themes. There's even more specific GWPs only available with a single set and often sold out immediately. I know a German LEGO forum where a lot of people are talking about staying up till 1 am, snagging one of these exclusive GWPs, then selling it off immediately (whether they like the GWP itself or not) so they'll have gotten the main set at a price they can somewhat justify. That's absurd if you think about it - I can't even think of any other company, toy company or not, that does business like that - but perfectly normal in today's LEGO circles. I can think of a few that are far worse though. You just have to look at some shoe brands where some limited collection drops at a certain time and usually is gone within minutes if not seconds. I don´t even remember a single GWP that sold out in less than an hour, let alone after some seconds. And as @Virginia_Bricks mentioned the same goes for certain tickets and I could name further examples. On 1/27/2026 at 2:39 PM, Virginia_Bricks said: But for some people the hobby is Lego being a toy and a collectible, not just a toy. You might not interact with it that way, but plenty of people do. I mean look at Funko Pops, Pokemon Cards, Hot Wheels, and so many more toy brands. Be thankful grading and protective sleeves have so far stayed away from Lego. For some people the collecting brings as much as joy as the building. It isn´t really that common, but it isn´t really like it doesn´t happen at all, especially for older Sets. And yeah, some people put their sets into Acryl Cases, which would be the protective sleeves for Lego. Quote
Virginia_Bricks Posted January 28 Posted January 28 39 minutes ago, Black Falcon said: At least some GWPs exclusive to a certain Set have sold out quickly, Minas Tirith will probably be among them. Gringotts wasn´t avaiable in the US for Insiders weekend? For like 10-20 minutes. Lion Knight's Castle went quicker, but Gringotts was the second set to sell out in the US for Insiders Weekend. Quote
Black Falcon Posted January 28 Posted January 28 1 hour ago, Virginia_Bricks said: For like 10-20 minutes. Lion Knight's Castle went quicker, but Gringotts was the second set to sell out in the US for Insiders Weekend. Ah intersting. LKC was gone within a minute, but I think Gringotts was avaiable for a way longer period. here. Quote
RODDY Posted January 30 Posted January 30 (edited) In the process of building the Lovegood House and man this maybe a Top 5 favorite Lego Harry Potter set, they absolutely nailed this location, love all the crazy colors and crooked architecture. And the light feature is perfection. Edited January 30 by RODDY Quote
Gorilla94 Posted January 30 Posted January 30 3 hours ago, RODDY said: In the process of building the Lovegood House and man this maybe a Top 5 favorite Lego Harry Potter set, they absolutely nailed this location, love all the crazy colors and crooked architecture. And the light feature is perfection. Yeah, I really like how they realised it. If I didn't limit myself to Howgarts for space reasons I would 100% get it^^' Quote
JHCLFM Posted January 31 Posted January 31 Should I get the great hall from Lego for double VIP points today or wait for a discount later? (it’s currently gone from amazon and other retailers in my country) Quote
joeee Posted January 31 Posted January 31 23 hours ago, Gorilla94 said: Yeah, I really like how they realised it. If I didn't limit myself to Howgarts for space reasons I would 100% get it^^' So no Privet Drive, Burrow nor the Knight Bus? Quote
BrickBob Studpants Posted January 31 Posted January 31 On 1/30/2026 at 8:11 PM, RODDY said: In the process of building the Lovegood House and man this maybe a Top 5 favorite Lego Harry Potter set, they absolutely nailed this location, love all the crazy colors and crooked architecture. And the light feature is perfection. Not sure if I would rank it quite that highly myself (top 15 or even top 10 material for sure though), but it's definitely a very well-made set that stands out among the crowd And yes, that is one of the best light brick integrations I've ever seen in a set, rivaled only by the Disney 100 projector GWP and a similar feature in a recent Friends set. The fact the window panels for that feature are all printed, just like they were in the other sets, adds a lot of value too! Quote
Gorilla94 Posted January 31 Posted January 31 1 hour ago, joeee said: So no Privet Drive, Burrow nor the Knight Bus? Jup. I have a shelf full of Simpsons modulars (the 3 originals plus 2 mocs), a Display case with all lotr characters, one with all gotham characters, some outstanding sets like Wall-E... with the Hogwarts castle filling a living room table my collection is pretty close to the limit spacewise. Quote
JeanGreyForever Posted February 1 Posted February 1 On 1/30/2026 at 4:47 PM, Gorilla94 said: Yeah, I really like how they realised it. If I didn't limit myself to Howgarts for space reasons I would 100% get it^^' This is me too. There's just way too many locations in Harry Potter for me to buy all the sets that aren't at Hogwarts. I only have Diagon Alley that isn't a Hogwarts themed set, and as much as I love that set, I do regret getting it because I have no space. Particularly since I also collect Disney and Marvel. And am strongly considering getting into LOTR, which I've also avoided due to lack of space. Quote
Black Falcon Posted February 1 Posted February 1 10 hours ago, JeanGreyForever said: This is me too. There's just way too many locations in Harry Potter for me to buy all the sets that aren't at Hogwarts. I only have Diagon Alley that isn't a Hogwarts themed set, and as much as I love that set, I do regret getting it because I have no space. Particularly since I also collect Disney and Marvel. And am strongly considering getting into LOTR, which I've also avoided due to lack of space. Yeah, that probably is the main problem for people nowadays, probably for many even before money. The good thing however is, if you regret getting the Diagon Alley you can always sell it off without losing money - probably better than to not have bought it and regretting that, since you would have to spend more for it now. Quote
RODDY Posted February 1 Posted February 1 23 hours ago, BrickBob Studpants said: Not sure if I would rank it quite that highly myself (top 15 or even top 10 material for sure though), but it's definitely a very well-made set that stands out among the crowd And yes, that is one of the best light brick integrations I've ever seen in a set, rivaled only by the Disney 100 projector GWP and a similar feature in a recent Friends set. The fact the window panels for that feature are all printed, just like they were in the other sets, adds a lot of value too! Yea I get that, there’s just so many great Harry Potter sets I can definitely see how you’d prefer others over it. We’ve been absolutely spoiled since the reboot imo. Quote
BrickBob Studpants Posted February 1 Posted February 1 One of the unknown sets is a buildable Norbert(a)! Quote
Accio Lego Posted February 2 Posted February 2 47 minutes ago, BrickBob Studpants said: One of the unknown sets is a buildable Norbert(a)! Oh no, I’ve been skipping most of the buildable animal sets the past few years, but if they actually do a good buildable baby dragon I might not be able to resist. Quote
Lion King Posted February 2 Posted February 2 23 minutes ago, Accio Lego said: Oh no, I’ve been skipping most of the buildable animal sets the past few years, but if they actually do a good buildable baby dragon I might not be able to resist. I never get into buildable animals in my life but now someone said Noberta…. I will see how it looks. Quote
Vindicare Posted February 2 Posted February 2 On 1/31/2026 at 11:55 AM, JHCLFM said: Should I get the great hall from Lego for double VIP points today or wait for a discount later? (it’s currently gone from amazon and other retailers in my country) Seeing as it’s creeping close to its retirement date, I would grab it now. Especially with double points going on. Quote
Accio Lego Posted February 2 Posted February 2 So, looking at the piece counts vs. prices of the set leaks is interesting. Knockturn Alley Shops, Hogwarts: East Wing, and Forbidden Forest: Expecto Patronum are all about what I’d expect, especially since they all involve large and/or new animal molds. Hogwarts Crest and Dobby the Free Elf are also around what you’d expect for buildable display pieces. They’ve got a much better parts to piece ratio, but ultimately don’t have minifigures or large molded/printed pieces. The Hogwarts Plants and Baby Norbert sets are interesting though. The Plants apparently cost $100 for 817 pieces. To put it in perspective, if you search through the current Botanicals sets you’ll find one going for the same price (the winter Wreath) that has nearly 1200 pieces. Likewise, Norbert costs $50 and only has 480 pieces, which isn’t bad, but it’s much closer to a playset than a buildable creature. Norbert could be explained by the baby dragon featuring large custom molds and/or fabric wings (which would definitely be appreciated), but the ratio on the plants set is crazy. The only thing I can think of off the top of my head is there might be a small sound brick for the theoretical mandrake build, although the price per piece ratio isn’t nearly as bad as the Sorting Hat set. I suppose the other option has be discussed before – that it’s name has been mistranslated and it’s not a themed Botanicals set at all, but another castle playset. Quote
Virginia_Bricks Posted February 2 Posted February 2 The Mandrake also had a high price per piece point without a light or sound brick. Same thing with the Thestrals. So I'd guess some form of cloth piece for Norbert and the botanical set will just be expensive from some large pieces like the Fish Tank was. Really hoping the other rumored set is true because all these non-play sets, while I'm sure they will look good, aren't worth it to reallocate the limited budget I have for Lego each year. Quote
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