Army Building

[Zarkan]

From all my time on Eurobricks, the subject of army building seems to be one of the most popular discussion topics. A lot of people on and off this site have amassed large armies of minifigures, while many others do not. It's also usually confined to a few long lasting themes, which have been around for many years. I'm curious as to people's motives for participating in army building or not, so I made this topic and poll so people could share their thoughts about one of the more common practices among lego fans.

Personally, I've never been too fond of the practice myself. I do enjoy displaying my lego sets and minifigs, but I usually focus my efforts on collecting and enjoying a large variety of sets and minifigures. I rarely buy more than one of the same set, and even if I had a lot more money, I would probably use it to buy a lot of different sets, rather than buying a ton of the same kit or minifig. Some part of me feels that spending so much time amassing huge armies of the same few minifigures is defeating the purpose of the hobby and reducing it to the level of other geek toys like G.I.Joe and Transformers. It's not that I have anything against those toys - it's just that non-children investors in these toys generally just collect them and display them. Lego, on the other hand, is a hobby that invites people of all ages to build and create new models, which IMO sets it apart from most other toys. So, when people spend tons of money on buying hundreds of identical Imperial Soldiers or castle knights, and don't spend much time with the actual bricks of the system, then I really have a hard time understanding the practice.

Still, this is just my opinion, and I'm very interested in how other people feel about army building.

Edited May 24, 2009 by Grevious

[kill will]

My army of Toopians and Xardux are mainly for using vehicles and being in battle scenes. It's not much of an army, just about 20 units, most of them unique.

[Etzel]

This is a very interesting topic, thanks for making it Grevious!

I'm an army builder, but not a great one. You might want to call it "patrol" building I like making armies in the size of 5-10 soldiers in the Pirate, Castle and Adventure theme. At that size the armies are perfect too be included in a medium sized MOC and that's the size I like the most to build. To me it's really important that I use the armies in MOCs, just having them as display isn't enough for me. If I had more parts so I could build really big MOCs I probably would expand my armies to a proper size but for now I'm pleased with their numbers.

At the moment I got three armies, a Swedish Carolean army from the early 1800th century, a Russian army from the same time and a Chinese army (from the Orient Expedition theme) but I'm also working on a Castle army with an own faction. I like to have somewhat unusual armies apart from common redcoats, bluecoats, stormtroopers etc. I hope I will be able to show them in action soon.

[Natman8000]

I love Tuskens! I have almost 25 now. I don't plan on stopping.

[CP5670]

I don't really collect armies either. I may get a bunch of identical minifigs (not more than 15-20) for a MOC, but they are part of that specific MOC as far as I'm concerned and wouldn't be very interesting to just put up and display on their own.

[Peppermint_M]

I am not really into army building. I have quite a few figures but I like them to be unique.

I will have an army of Agents and Inferno figures by the time I finish my Agents and Agents 2.0 collection. Plus extras for specific roles.

I have lots of random castle figures/knights.

[daxflame680]

Yes, I army build, because armies are awesome.

Right now I'm army building in Star Wars and Pirates. I prefer to army build using minifigs from impulse sets and BPs.

I do think that 'real' building is a lot more fun though. My armies will probably only grow to around 30 men. Models are more fun.

Edited May 24, 2009 by daxflame680

[Commander_Blitz]

I'm building a clone army and an army of the old-style skeletons. For some reason I can't stand the ones with evil faces and the giant arms are just bleh.

[Holy Diver]

I consider myself an army builder, though most of my armies are few in number. My Star Wars armies are the largest, I have amassed 100 battle droids, 40 clones, and 30 stormtroopers (and 6 rebels). My castle army is made up of 50 different figures, some borrowed from other lines such as Ninja or Vikings, or modified to fit the castle theme. I also build bionicle armies, but they are very small. I would like to expand my armies, but it just a far too expensive hobby.

[prateek]

i dont have an army because i dont have any sets that could have "army material" minifigs (eg. castle, star wars, pirates, etc...)

[BlueBard]

If such a thing exist, I must confess I'm a real Town Army builder (mostly Maffia), specially because I like to give to every MF an individual look and not a standard one like Pirates or Vastle themes with uniforms.

Nice topic BTW!

[Oky]

I got into army building just recently myself. Before, I didn't see the point in armies and didn't have the budget for building them, but now that has changed. I build my (Star Wars) armies because it's just cool to have and to display an impressively large amount of minifigs. I have about a hundred droids and twenty Clone Wars clones, all collected through buying sets. I'm still collecting clones, but I have stopped (purposely) collecting droids because I think 100 is an impressive enough number of minifigs to have. Anything above that starts becoming ridiculous IMO.

I agree that sets are equally as important as minifigs and that some people obsess about minifigs too much.

Edited May 25, 2009 by Oky Wan Kenobi

[WhiteFang]

Grevious, this is a very interesting topic!

I noted there are many discussions across LEGO Community and there are many School of Thoughts pertaining towards Army Building. I, for one, is more towards or known as LEGO Army Builder instead of a MOC. It's an interesting point, that most MOC builders prefer more towards building instead of collecting mere minifigs, while Army builders will love to collect and increase the sheer quantity of their armies as they acquire on. That's the very main differences between above. IMHO, I think both thoughts are correct based on their own perspective and understanding.

To me, army building is also known as a form of collection where we demostrate and show the arrangement of your prefered battalion or divisional army based on the timeline or theme which you are trying to potray. As you have more minifigs under your charge in terms of similar design and arrangement, you are able to illustrate sizes of different squads, platoons, units, company, brigade or division level based on your own imagination. It's simply like collecting minifigs, like when you are a child, playing with those green plastic soldiers, or whatever you called that. It's like those boys kind of imagination, where such awesome majestic display can be done through this manner.

Therefore, I build armies based on acquiring multiple impulse sets, small sets that offer the best expansion building for my armies, which I am focusing on such as Castle, Pirates, Ninja and a little bit of Star Wars and others. Military might and display, may look boring to others, but I don't think it's that boring since minifigs are one of the primary reasons for us to buy LEGO. As much as possible, I will still continue to get more minifigs as much as I could.

For example, this is what I have shared with my fellow EB members of my Ninja army, and this is what I have done with my collection. Click onto the image for a better understanding of my army building concept.

[Sandy]

I collect minifigs, too, and I love it, but I aim for diversity and variety, not sheer quantity. My childish dream is to own every individual minifig ever made, but I don't mind if there's only one for each.

I see no point in owning a whole army of identical minifigs, although I have no qualms for some people building such armies. If I build an army for MOCing purposes, I usually make sure that the minifigs are individualized, all with different heads and a variety of helmets, legs and torsos.

[Zorro]

I am an armybuilder, collecting minifigs I can use for my Napoleonic armies.

I buy the new Redcoats to reinforce my English army, but I also buy the classic redcoats and of course the bluecoats for my French army.

Other units like eg. German/Austrian Landwehr/Infantry/Cavalry are made of the old captains uniforms suited with shakos.

[Rijkvv]

I voted no. Because of priorities. I have some sets that I really want (for example the complete Western theme). I also have ideas for MOCs, some of them quite big, and a lay-out. For these things I have to order and collect a lot of pieces. Somethimes between these purchases I buy some sets that are useful for armybuilding, but only one or two. It would help if a Snowtrooper Battle Pack was available in the shops, though.

Maybe if I'm done with collecting and my lay-out I start building a big huge Imperial army, that will wipe all of your armies out and conquer the whole galaxy!

[penguinz]

I said that I do not. The biggest reason for me is that I do not have a theme in which I could do "army building". My main interest is in city. In city you could call building a brigade policemen or firemen "army building". If this is it, then I do army building to some extent. My firemen currently are at 17 minifigs! Apart from city I would do army building in castle, but I most of my time and money goes to city. However, whenever I have amassed amounts of minifigures, they always are spead out around my displays.

[gogobig]

What a great topic

I do consider myself an army builder. In the past 3 years I have been working on the castle project that cost me quite a bit of $$$. My minifig collection is around 1,000 minifigures, of which about 95% are castle themed (16 factions). The other 5% is pirates, theme that I will pursue in the upcoming years

I purchased various old sets, such as Wolfpack, Forestmen, Dark Forest, Royal Knights, Dragon Masters, Black Knights from Ebay and the last 3 years of castle sets from LEGO S@H not for the minifigs themselves, but because I could not have these sets when I was growing up.

Besides that, I use BL a lot for various parts such as torsos, heads, legs and weapons. I do A LOT of custom work and most of my minifigs are custom-you will see in the upcoming days some pics.

I enjoy collecting minifigures for various reasons from displaying large quantities of minifigs to creating diveristy among my army lines. This also alows me to have several factions and make it more interesting. However, there is a fine line between building an army and stocking on minifigs-I saw some pics on Brickshelf of 100s of exactly the same minifigs and Im thinking "Oh how fun". I dont prefer that. I Change heads so that not to many figures look alike. I also try not to have 100s of the exactly same unit, such as swordsmen. I diverisfy with weapons and 40 soldiers is my max for one weapon. For example, the royal knights have 40 pikeman, 40 archers, 20 swordsmen, 15 cavarly and so on. Personally, I would not want any faction to have more then 200 minifigs.

Im planning this interesting project for the castle and hopefully pirate themes in the upcoming years ;)

[Dadster]

Very good polling questions.

I've got armies of knights and trolls. I used to amass Stormtroopers as well, but have since begun concentrating on Castle stuff.

[Commodore Hornbricker]

I am a proud armybuilder! My collection all ranges around the priates them. I have 100's of red and blue coat soldiers (old and new)...100's of saliors and pirates and 100's of villagers. I am closing in on 100 islanders. Only a handfull of spaniards though. I incorporate minifigures from western, IJ, adventurers, castle and others that I think will make suitable soldiers, saliors, pirates, villagers and natives. I can't get enough. I have about 2000 in my collection most of which I submitted as part of the armybuilding thread.

[Commander Flash]

I've been collecting clone troopers, now i have 87. Bigger than some, Dwarfed by others.

[Tom Bricks]

I try to build small armies of different figs but it is low on my list of lego buying priorities. When I have the option of one of the battle packs or a set of the same price I have to go with the set.

[Mraz Skintas]

I do build Armies. Clones and Halo Marines and Elites (and various other Covenant troops)

I recently sold most of my collection a while ago, as I was in my dark age. I have now come out and am working on rebuilding my Armies. Right now I have about 50 Elites, 10 Brutes, 15 Grunts (those helmets are hard to find) and I think thats it for my Covies. I have a few Flood forms, and about 30 Marines.

As for my other obsession, the Clones, I only have 30 or so. That seems like alot, but I am aiming for 100 before I post pics. It has been hard to find the Battle Packs in stores lately.

But thats all I have right now, more are being amassed as we speak.

[alex12]

I like to have most minifigs with different heads. You can't do that when army building.

I don't like everyone to look the same.

[gogobig]

I like to have most minifigs with different heads. You can't do that when army building.

I don't like everyone to look the same.

Wrong my friend, You will see my pics in the upcoming days/weeks. I have around 1000 minifigs and barely any have the same face from the same faction and line (archers, light infantry [that this breaks down], heavy infantry, cavalry, and elite units). The only exception that I have for this are orcs, some forestmen and some wolfpack.