Unpopular Opinions related to Lego Star Wars

[JintaiZ]

On ‎9‎/‎10‎/‎2020 at 9:20 AM, Curbthetide said:

10195 is one of my favorite sets, and I agree that it does need to be updated.  The walker is particularly bad; it doesn't look good on its own.  It suffers from a lack of detail, I'm assuming this is because they were trying to keep the part count and price point down.  The dropship is a little more detailed, but could use some more greebling.  I've been waiting for them to remake this set in the same way they remade the Y-wing and Millennium Falcon, but from what I've seen so far it's not even rumored to be re-released.  All things considered, it is a big, sexy set but has not aged well and needs a serious update.  

But then the price is at $249 (Equal to $299 Nowadays)

[Mountain Man]

People over obsess on tiny details like arm printing on minifigs, and forget Lego is a commercial toy company not just one serving adult collectors, the 2021 set rumours reaction also applies here

On 9/9/2020 at 6:29 AM, MaximillianRebo said:

Personally I don't get the appeal of army building. If you have plans to build a big battle setting that makes sense, but a lot of the time it seems to be just rows upon rows of figures lined up on baseplates. Maybe it's because I don't have a huge amount of money to spend on Lego so I'd rather get a variety of what's available rather than umpteen of the same box.

I'm exactly the same. I like 1 a lot of different characters not 100 of the same.

[macaron35]

On 9/9/2020 at 7:29 AM, MaximillianRebo said:

Personally I don't get the appeal of army building. If you have plans to build a big battle setting that makes sense, but a lot of the time it seems to be just rows upon rows of figures lined up on baseplates. Maybe it's because I don't have a huge amount of money to spend on Lego so I'd rather get a variety of what's available rather than umpteen of the same box.

The big problem is that TLG never allowed fans to recreate an army by selling clones/troopers in bulk.

I wanted to have a "small" army lined up for the arrival of the emperor just like on the destroyer, it took me a while to collect 50 stormtroopers :(

[Mandalorianknight]

On 9/19/2020 at 6:25 AM, macaron35 said:

The big problem is that TLG never allowed fans to recreate an army by selling clones/troopers in bulk.

I wanted to have a "small" army lined up for the arrival of the emperor just like on the destroyer, it took me a while to collect 50 stormtroopers :(

They can't, or at least couldn't. Hasbro had the exclusive rights to sell action figures, and minifigures somehow counted, so the battle pack sets are the closest lego can get. Rumor is, since hasbro changed their agreement with disney, they may now be able too.

On 9/19/2020 at 2:33 AM, Mountain Man said:

People over obsess on tiny details like arm printing on minifigs, and forget Lego is a commercial toy company not just one serving adult collectors, the 2021 set rumours reaction also applies here

Yup. 2021 wave is going to be amazing for kids, with the ability to get the two most iconic star wars vehicles for half their normal price.

[Samppu]

On 9/19/2020 at 10:33 AM, Mountain Man said:

People over obsess on tiny details like arm printing on minifigs, and forget Lego is a commercial toy company not just one serving adult collectors, the 2021 set rumours reaction also applies here

This might have been an argument five years ago, but not anymore. According to the news on Brothers Brick (that is, a reliable source) AFOL market makes up as much as 20% of the revenue since 2020, which is very very much. The number is still a little unbelievable to me, even with the corona effect when people hang out more inside, but nevertheless, Lego probably would not have started the all new 18+ series if the AFOL market wasn't big.

 

Edited September 21, 2020 by Samppu

[Mountain Man]

3 hours ago, Samppu said:

This might have been an argument five years ago, but not anymore. According to the news on Brothers Brick (that is, a reliable source) AFOL market makes up as much as 20% of the revenue since 2020, which is very very much. The number is still a little unbelievable to me, even with the corona effect when people hang out more inside, but nevertheless, Lego probably would not have started the all new 18+ series if the AFOL market wasn't big.

 

So still a small minority. And for all the shouting, how many people genuinely didn't buy the Cantina set for example because of lack of arm printing as a main reason? 

Edited September 21, 2020 by Mountain Man

[TeddytheSpoon]

4 hours ago, Samppu said:

This might have been an argument five years ago, but not anymore. According to the news on Brothers Brick (that is, a reliable source) AFOL market makes up as much as 20% of the revenue since 2020, which is very very much. The number is still a little unbelievable to me, even with the corona effect when people hang out more inside, but nevertheless, Lego probably would not have started the all new 18+ series if the AFOL market wasn't big.

 

The problem with AFOL as a catch-all term is that it assumes all AFOLs have the same requirements from their LEGO, which we can see from this thread alone is not necessarily true. AFOLs in that 20% (on which incidentally I agree with you, I think that might be a rather optimistic number for which we haven't seen the small print) will include minifigure collectors and customisers, army builders, MOCers, statue collectors, and the casual adult who isn't really an AFOL, who I think the 18+ line is aimed at.

It would be interesting to do a census of the entire global AFOL population and see the exact breakdown of that 20%. I for one don't care for super-detailed minifigures as they're meant to be caricatures of their subject matter, which is why I tend to shy away from custom minifigures and don't care for arm printing and dual molding - but I have no idea if I'm in the majority, if there is one.

[Samppu]

4 hours ago, Mountain Man said:

So still a small minority. And for all the shouting, how many people genuinely didn't buy the Cantina set for example because of lack of arm printing as a main reason? 

20% of 14 billion market is not a minority in any absolute sense. Again, I suspect if the number really is that high, but say even 10% of 14 billion market is ridiculously huge.

 

3 hours ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

The problem with AFOL as a catch-all term is that it assumes all AFOLs have the same requirements from their LEGO, which we can see from this thread alone is not necessarily true. AFOLs in that 20% (on which incidentally I agree with you, I think that might be a rather optimistic number for which we haven't seen the small print) will include minifigure collectors and customisers, army builders, MOCers, statue collectors, and the casual adult who isn't really an AFOL, who I think the 18+ line is aimed at.

It would be interesting to do a census of the entire global AFOL population and see the exact breakdown of that 20%. I for one don't care for super-detailed minifigures as they're meant to be caricatures of their subject matter, which is why I tend to shy away from custom minifigures and don't care for arm printing and dual molding - but I have no idea if I'm in the majority, if there is one.

Yep, I agree that the AFOL builders, so MOCers as we are in this forum, make probably only a minority of the adult Lego world including as you said collectors, casual adults etc. and I would be interested in as well to know a little more details about the numbers associated to adults and Lego (if Lego itself even has a clue). Nevertheless, I would guess it is a safe bet that the more detailed are the most popular ones among most of the different groups. If they weren't, why aren't the majority still collecting and hunting the originals without e.g. the backprints from the early 2000s? Or let us consider e.g. the new double molded helmet of the scout trooper whose price skyrocketed the first day it was introduced. At least the many common examples of the popularity status of different figures and parts support the notion that more is more for the most with minifigures. This is not to say that one needs to care anyway as of course, anyone can focus on whatever she or he likes. And as I stated before, it is not that hard to rub the prints away from the arms etc. if someone prefers the figures without them.

Edited September 21, 2020 by Samppu

[MAB]

Just now, Samppu said:

Yep, I agree that the AFOL builders, so MOCers as we are in this forum,

I imagine many people here are MOCers. But I also imagine many are not MOCers but still collect and build SW sets. And some collect them but won't open them. But they are all AFOLs.

 

[Mountain Man]

2 minutes ago, Samppu said:

20% of 14 billion market is not a minority in any absolute sense. 

Its a minority. 

And even within that minority, its a subset who obsess over, and very vocally make issue with things out of proportion

[MAB]

19 minutes ago, Mountain Man said:

Its a minority. 

And even within that minority, its a subset who obsess over, and very vocally make issue with things out of proportion

Everyone that does something with LEGO is a minority at some point. Star Wars fans - minority. City fans - minority. Ninjago fans - minority.  Technic fans - minority. Adults - minority. Children - majority, but the girl fans - minority. Boys aged 10-12, minority.

LEGO does loads of products targeted at different minorities.

Personally I don't have an issue with arm printing or not on Greedo, since I have the original one. But it is a little surprising that LEGO were able to print Greedo's arms 16 years ago but omitted it here (and the last cantina too).

[Samppu]

17 hours ago, Mountain Man said:

Its a minority. 

And even within that minority, its a subset who obsess over, and very vocally make issue with things out of proportion

20% of the 14 billion market equals roughly 2.8 billion market for adults, be they builders or collectors or whatever.
It might be a minority in the sense that yes, it is only 25% of the market for kids, but 2.8 billion market is still in the absolute sense so big that it makes a lot of sense to try to keep them happy. Of course, it might be difficult to discover which opinions truly represent the majority of the market (I bet the Lego Group as any other big business has its own high salary consultant group doing just that every day), and I wonder what effect, if any, these forum discussions might have at the Lego Group (I have heard that they indeed at least keep an eye on them as a source of information), but anyway it would be unwise to totally ignore the possibility that missing prints might affect sales or general perception of quality, especially in these times that the Chinese copycats are a real problem.

Edited September 22, 2020 by Samppu

[Samppu]

17 hours ago, MAB said:

Everyone that does something with LEGO is a minority at some point. Star Wars fans - minority. City fans - minority. Ninjago fans - minority.  Technic fans - minority. Adults - minority. Children - majority, but the girl fans - minority. Boys aged 10-12, minority.

LEGO does loads of products targeted at different minorities.

Personally I don't have an issue with arm printing or not on Greedo, since I have the original one. But it is a little surprising that LEGO were able to print Greedo's arms 16 years ago but omitted it here (and the last cantina too).

Like argued before, each of these subgroups is in the absolute sense very huge, so it makes sense to try to keep them all happy.
In addition, one perhaps enlightening idea about the general marketing strategy in the field is that the market segments for each of these groups you mentioned are actually relatively stable. Some exceptions do occur and there are some age related predictable changes (e.g. boys moving from City to Technic as they age), but generally the concern when releasing new waves of sets is not that the people who liked Technic would now have totally changed to Star Wars etc. Thus marketing campaigns rarely fail because of total flops, when no one buys any of the products, because the interest for the products is there in the case of Lego consumers. Star Wars fans want Lego Star Wars, Technic fans want Lego Technic etc. Instead, the more typical failure is to over produce a set that is thought to be popular but that ends up not to be. People still buy it, because always someone does, but the income does not meet the production cost causing a negative net profit. With surprisingly popular sets this can happen to the other direction: 501st battle backs could make even better revenue, had they prepared to produce them in masses. And for this reason it really makes sense to consider the arm printing and other such stuff, because if a set fails to meet expectations, it might be enough that only a minority of the segment decides to pass it and the net profit turns to negative for that particular set.

Edited September 22, 2020 by Samppu

[Mountain Man]

31 minutes ago, Samppu said:

. And for this reason it really makes sense to consider the arm printing and other such stuff, 

Do people really think a single sale was lost of the Cantina due to arm printing? 

Topics such as it are the issue I have, that there is a very vocal moaning on certain issues, that in reality doesn't manifest itself in actions

[ArneNielsen]

22 hours ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

According to the news on Brothers Brick (that is, a reliable source) AFOL market makes up as much as 20% of the revenue since 2020

The LEGO CEO is the source of the 20%; he mentioned that on the Danish TV, when commenting on the half-year financial result.

So yes, this number is legit.

[Samppu]

1 hour ago, Mountain Man said:

Do people really think a single sale was lost of the Cantina due to arm printing? 

Topics such as it are the issue I have, that there is a very vocal moaning on certain issues, that in reality doesn't manifest itself in actions

Short answer: yes. It might not be the majority of the target group as you said, but for the reasons mentioned above, the minority can be important in determining whether the net profit turns positive or negative. Of course, other factors play a role as well, but my point being that the general trend in free trading is often that the net profit is usually only just above the limit that trading scores positive income and for that reason these kinds of small factors shouldn't be totally ignored.

The reason why big companies such as Lego are successful and stable is not that they would usually make large profits from individual sales, but because they make relatively small profits, even a lot of losses, from individual sales, but globally they make so ridiculously many of them (7 sets sold every second) that the total annual revenue is positive and huge. This does not apply to every possible company, though, but generally to the markets where there is a lot of competition.

32 minutes ago, ArneNielsen said:

The LEGO CEO is the source of the 20%; he mentioned that on the Danish TV, when commenting on the half-year financial result.

So yes, this number is legit.

Ok, wow, thanks for the fact, I am truly amazed. Still,some part of the effect might be due to the corona and kids flowing out to stare their phones rather than new adults flowing in, but nevertheless, this is a good trend. More active AFOL world. 

Edited September 22, 2020 by Samppu

[MAB]

2 hours ago, Mountain Man said:

Do people really think a single sale was lost of the Cantina due to arm printing? 

Topics such as it are the issue I have, that there is a very vocal moaning on certain issues, that in reality doesn't manifest itself in actions

I'd be surprised if it was a significant number, but sometimes lots of little things turn into big things and it doesn't take much to tip the balance. Missing a key figure here, not printing that one very well there and duplicating that one from a cheap set might soon turn a buy into a don't buy unless on a discount.

[Hemlock Falls]

Hi, I’m new in the Star Wars forum, but I bet I have a really unpopular opinion....

Call me naive, but I was 5 when ESB came out, so I grew up with the OT story. I was in college when PT movies started coming out, So yeah, I wasn’t really too into it. All I remember was they introduced clones in one movie, then turned them into bad guys (killing all the Jedi) almost immediately. Within one movie anyways. So I always considered clones to be just older stormtroopers with sillier costumes. I missed out on the clone wars cartoons, cause I was an adult starting a career and a family. It wasn’t until this year that I learned thru lego that many people consider clones to be good guys, and that they’re so emphatically passionate about them. I just put them in with the storm troopers cause from more than 3 feet away they visually fit right in.  

[Pedilego]

Lego is the biggest toy company in the world by a wide margin. According to one article I found, Bandai is the 2nd biggest at $1.6 billion (as of 2019). Based on that, if TLG decided to enforce 18+ and become "adults only", they'd still be the largest toy company in the world.

 

50 minutes ago, Hemlock Falls said:

Hi, I’m new in the Star Wars forum, but I bet I have a really unpopular opinion....

Call me naive, but I was 5 when ESB came out, so I grew up with the OT story. I was in college when PT movies started coming out, So yeah, I wasn’t really too into it. All I remember was they introduced clones in one movie, then turned them into bad guys (killing all the Jedi) almost immediately. Within one movie anyways. So I always considered clones to be just older stormtroopers with sillier costumes. I missed out on the clone wars cartoons, cause I was an adult starting a career and a family. It wasn’t until this year that I learned thru lego that many people consider clones to be good guys, and that they’re so emphatically passionate about them. I just put them in with the storm troopers cause from more than 3 feet away they visually fit right in.  

Yeah, probably a minority opinion on here but certainly not rare.

It's def fair to say they were bad guys in the movies, but what the cartoon showed is that they're victims, too, forced to betray their brothers-and-sisters-in-arms against their will.

It's more than them just being good guys, though; aesthetically, the colors & variations offer wider appeal. I'd compare it to classic sneakers or sports uniforms versus what Nike's been able to do with those products.

 

BTW I drudged through the series a few years ago. Season 7 happened earlier this year. Wow. Re-watched the entire series over the summer with my daughter. Changed me from neutral about Clones to a big fan. If you/anybody's interested, I made a list of ~30 eps for a friend to watch before Season 2 of Mando.

[Hemlock Falls]

I was kind of just joking. I don’t put clones with stormtroopers. Don’t take me seriously. I wouldn’t make my first post in the Star Wars forum just to piss people off. I just thought it would fit in a thread called “unpopular opinions”.  I did think clones were the original stormtroopers and they definitely look like them (I don’t care what anyone says). But that’s cause I’ve never seen clone wars, but now I’d like to. After playing battlefronts 1 & 2, and buying several CW era LEGO ships, I feel like I need to update my knowledge of that part of the saga. Where is the best place to find all the seasons? I have Disney+ and Netflix and stuff, but it’s not as easy to find as I thought it would be.

[Omand]

3 minutes ago, Hemlock Falls said:

I was kind of just joking. I don’t put clones with stormtroopers. Don’t take me seriously. I wouldn’t make my first post in the Star Wars forum just to piss people off. I just thought it would fit in a thread called “unpopular opinions”.  I did think clones were the original stormtroopers and they definitely look like them (I don’t care what anyone says). But that’s cause I’ve never seen clone wars, but now I’d like to. After playing battlefronts 1 & 2, and buying several CW era LEGO ships, I feel like I need to update my knowledge of that part of the saga. Where is the best place to find all the seasons? I have Disney+ and Netflix and stuff, but it’s not as easy to find as I thought it would be.

If you have Disney+ then go over to the Star Wars Portal, and under that you will find a line for Series.  Clone Wars should be there with two entries (one for Season 1 - 6 and the second for Season 7 stand-alone).

Cheers :)

[Hemlock Falls]

Thanks.

not to wear out my welcome already, but could someone maybe direct me to where would be a cool spot to show off some photos of my SW collection? Or is that frowned upon here? I never know. 

[Pedilego]

33 minutes ago, Hemlock Falls said:

I was kind of just joking. I don’t put clones with stormtroopers. Don’t take me seriously. I wouldn’t make my first post in the Star Wars forum just to piss people off. I just thought it would fit in a thread called “unpopular opinions”.  I did think clones were the original stormtroopers and they definitely look like them (I don’t care what anyone says). But that’s cause I’ve never seen clone wars, but now I’d like to. After playing battlefronts 1 & 2, and buying several CW era LEGO ships, I feel like I need to update my knowledge of that part of the saga. Where is the best place to find all the seasons? I have Disney+ and Netflix and stuff, but it’s not as easy to find as I thought it would be.

 

As a lifelong fan, 'updating my knowledge' on the Clone Wars really expanded my enthusiasm for Star Wars. I enjoyed the PT just fine as a teen, but the final arch of the Clone Wars is up there with the OT for me. I was just sharing that; no offense taken, at all.

 

Couple things about the show:

• Lucas has a thing for telling stories out of order. I highly recommend chronological order, not release order: https://www.starwars.com/news/star-wars-the-clone-wars-chronological-episodeorder
• Shows are better when you learn the characters. Do the same with the clones. It's difficult at first & they're easy to dismiss as generic but it's worth it.
• It's Game of Thrones in reverse; starts off bad & progressively gets better. If you're struggling, find a "watch list" online that condenses the ~150 episodes into the most pivotal/entertaining episodes. You can always go back & fill in the gaps once you're actually invested.

 

This is the closest thing I've seen for posting collection. It's an old thread but it checks out:

https://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/18914-show-your-army-navy-and-collection-display/&page=79

 

 

On topic:

I think the disdain for Lego re-sellers is way overstated:

• Lego is very well aware of this group & if they wanted to find ways to shut or slow them down, they could. But, in a way, re-sellers provide a service to the community. It effectively extends the shelf life of sets. Yes, you're paying a premium to get it after it retires but imo that's only fair. For example, the early modulars are going for thousand(s) of dollars NIB because nearly all of the sets purchased were done with the intention of building. More recent retired modulars are going for far less because, in large part, there's a healthy amount of sets that were bought to be sold at a later date.
• I've done a lot of eBay sniping during COVID. I bought, built, and re-sold a lot of stuff. From it, I organized a lot of Lego & completed a lot of sets (e.g. BrickLink orders) - putting a decent number of sets 'back into circulation'. Personally, I got to build a lot of sets I wouldn't have otherwise been able to build, keep a lot of sets, figures, and/or parts for "free", and any money I made went back into our family Lego fund to buy stuff like the latest MBS. BTW Yes, I sold my Yoda lightsaber; it's what made the Cantina affordable enough to get when we did.

FWIW I'm not saying this as an absolute; there are times where it's scummy, but a lot of people out there seem to think it's an absolute that any or nearly any kind of re-selling is scummy. 

[Daddy_Stardust]

1 hour ago, Hemlock Falls said:

I was kind of just joking. I don’t put clones with stormtroopers. Don’t take me seriously. I wouldn’t make my first post in the Star Wars forum just to piss people off. I just thought it would fit in a thread called “unpopular opinions”.  I did think clones were the original stormtroopers and they definitely look like them (I don’t care what anyone says). But that’s cause I’ve never seen clone wars, but now I’d like to. 

Clone Wars was a great show (some episodes are rather awful, but it's got an overall quality level of something like Star Trek TNG: some great, a lot of good and some TERRIBLE, but overall, a nice little show that's well worth the investment.

But here's an unpopular opinion; I actually agree with you in your first post. I'm a dad who grew up on the OT, I hated the special editions and the prequels but grew to tolerate that new Star Wars era thanks to the Clone Wars as it progressed until I really quite liked it. Didn't mind the sequels and Resistance (the tone and camaraderie mostly, felt the battles were largely awful) but *loved* Rogue One, Solo and The Mandalorian. So the good outweighs the bad and I'm fine with Disney Star Wars; certainly prefer it to Lucas' Prequel and retcon-era Star Wars immensely other than Clone Wars.

But when it comes to the Lego, it's a fun hobby for both me and my son. They're his toys that he loves playing with but I modify for him using my love for the franchise and model making. And yes, the Old Republic Troopers, Old Republic Sith troopers, Prequel Clone Army, Imperial Stormtroopers and First Order Stormtroopers are all one big army of "you wear sinister plastic armour with a skull helmet = you're baddies" whilst poorly dressed cotton-clad soldiers with phoenix symbols regardless of whether they're rebels or resistance are all the same army on the side of good. After all, it's his toy room, not a chronological museum, so we have the goodies on one side, baddies on the other; if they look like stormtroopers or evil space monsters, they're bad. If they look like ragtag soldiers and heroic space wizards, they're good.

His "crate wars" and "walker assault" battles we have together (usually involves him winning and all the ships he makes me use getting blown to bits whilst I cringe at the rebuilding work involved) would be no fun together if we started getting anal retentive about time frames haha. 

[jimmynick]

12 hours ago, Hemlock Falls said:

Thanks.

not to wear out my welcome already, but could someone maybe direct me to where would be a cool spot to show off some photos of my SW collection? Or is that frowned upon here? I never know. 

There are plenty of pics of collections in this subforum, so go right ahead!