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Black Knights had dragon emblems on their shields/flags as early as 1988, but it wasn't until their spiritual successor 1993 Dragon Knights that actual Dragons were introduced.

Then 1997 Fright knights continued using the green dragons, but also introduced black variant, and black or neon orange wings, Time Cruisers also used a bunch of Wings or dragon horse helmets.

My biggest issue with experience at the time with those dragons were the clips were fragile.

But design wise it was pretty clever, the way you could attach flame in the mouth (flames had little side pins the past), as well as the overlap between dragon and crocodile head/tail usage.

Edited by TeriXeri

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1 hour ago, DBlegonerd7 said:

Did Cruasers theme use to have a molded dragon back in the past? If so, would it be likely to include a new/old molded dragon in this set?

A new molded dragon in a D2C set is unlikely. New molds in D2C sets are somewhat rare due to the high cost of new molds and the lower-than-average production volume for D2C sets (in other words, it's harder for a new mold to "pay for itself" from a D2C set alone). When they do occur, they're often things like figure parts (especially for a licensed theme where such parts would be essential to properly represent a given character) or structural/mechanical elements that can be reused elsewhere more easily, rather than costly preassembled parts like large molded animals or bigfigs.

Larger molded animals are typically more likely to come from normal retail sets that get produced and distributed in higher volume.

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2 hours ago, Alexandrina said:

There were no dragons in the Crusaders theme at all. I don't think fantasy elements came along until Fright Knights a few years later

Mmmhmm, okay. I guess my memory elves me wrong. 

1 hour ago, TeriXeri said:

Black Knights had dragon emblems on their shields/flags as early as 1988, but it wasn't until their spiritual successor 1993 Dragon Knights that actual Dragons were introduced.

Then 1997 Fright knights continued using the green dragons, but also introduced black variant, and black or neon orange wings, Time Cruisers also used a bunch of Wings or dragon horse helmets.

My biggest issue with experience at the time with those dragons were the clips were fragile.

But design wise it was pretty clever, the way you could attach flame in the mouth (flames had little side pins the past), as well as the overlap between dragon and crocodile head/tail usage.

Thank you for sharing the facts / history!

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7 hours ago, Sandbag58 said:

While I might dream of a new castle line I don't think we can look to the three recent castle offerings to provide us with an indication of TLG's strategic thought. This is because two of the three are the result of democratic processes over which TLG had no/limited control in deciding the outcome (which opens up a different debate about transparency of process etc...but that's for another topic thread). We still don't know what the anniversary set looks like or contains: it has 'castle' in the title but do you remember the pre-Nexo Knight speculation and the hope we had? I very much doubt we'll get another curve ball like that in this case but until I see pictures...

What we can hope for is that TLG look at how much fervour the two fan supported sets garnered and how well the three recent castle sets sell and TLG adapt their strategy accordingly. Having said that, we all know that scarcity drives up demand, so could the strategy be to drip feed us sets to keep us hungry for more? It's a bit cynical, but I've had one of those weeks! Someone somewhere will know the economics behind selling sets - larger vs small, through toy stores vs D2C...

But this does tell lego that there is a very good market for castle based sets.  This shows them we still want castle/fantasy sets and that there is definitely money to be made there which should help to show that Lego can produce these types of sets and they will sell well.  The 90th anniversary set was voted on by past themes so we know what they mean by castle there is no guessing here.  This is not a new big bang theme like Nexo Knights.  I think you can be assured that this will be classic castle based but with new techniques like creator has done.  If a new castle theme is to come I personally think it will be in a few years as they will need time to develop and create sets and possibly a story to it.  

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12 hours ago, zoth33 said:

But this does tell lego that there is a very good market for castle based sets.  This shows them we still want castle/fantasy sets and that there is definitely money to be made there which should help to show that Lego can produce these types of sets and they will sell well.  The 90th anniversary set was voted on by past themes so we know what they mean by castle there is no guessing here.  This is not a new big bang theme like Nexo Knights.  I think you can be assured that this will be classic castle based but with new techniques like creator has done.  If a new castle theme is to come I personally think it will be in a few years as they will need time to develop and create sets and possibly a story to it.  

Yes, I agree!

And thank you for correcting my needless Nexo Knight worry...I think I'm just a bit too excited and this is fizzing the brain :wacko:

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Nexo Knight did get me back into LEGO (I didn't collect LEGO from 2001 onward until 2016), but I can see the perspective from LEGO fans that it was a big shift from the nearly constant Castle lines that were produced up to 2013/2014. (with some "weird" variants like Knight Kingdom early on, and some junior-ish early 2000s).

However, LEGO should not try something like that for a forseeable future, especially now that Ninjago and Monkie Kid both have somewhat futuristic vehicles and mechs and both have various types of Monsters to battle with swords and shooters.

Jestro's Volcano Lair was by far my favorite "classic" castle type of set, maybe it's the nostalgia to the Fright Knight Castle I never had, while it might not have been the bastion with a drawbridge or gate, the stairs going around to the top was quite a nice design, and the colors would still easily work as a lava castle in a traditional sense (maybe with the sawblade/monster things removed a bit)

Knighton Castle wasn't bad at all either, Design wise it might not have a very realistic layout but as a playset with an open back, and a courtyard I think the design is still very suited to a Castle, with plenty room to set figures on the ramparts and towers.

The majority of the theme were vehicles however, I think the theme should've had more locations, as even the story did have many areas, from villages, forests, cities, or conceptual sea monsters.

That said, I hope for the forseeable future, Castle and Pirates will stay closer to their traditional roots, and the occasional side theme set like the Viking ship.

 

Edited by TeriXeri

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On 4/22/2022 at 2:24 PM, Sandbag58 said:

While I might dream of a new castle line I don't think we can look to the three recent castle offerings to provide us with an indication of TLG's strategic thought. This is because two of the three are the result of democratic processes over which TLG had no/limited control in deciding the outcome (which opens up a different debate about transparency of process etc...but that's for another topic thread). We still don't know what the anniversary set looks like or contains: it has 'castle' in the title but do you remember the pre-Nexo Knight speculation and the hope we had? I very much doubt we'll get another curve ball like that in this case but until I see pictures...

What we can hope for is that TLG look at how much fervour the two fan supported sets garnered and how well the three recent castle sets sell and TLG adapt their strategy accordingly. Having said that, we all know that scarcity drives up demand, so could the strategy be to drip feed us sets to keep us hungry for more? It's a bit cynical, but I've had one of those weeks! Someone somewhere will know the economics behind selling sets - larger vs small, through toy stores vs D2C...

Haha, the new big bang theme, lol. tbh,

I believe castle fans are prolly a niche minority. lego prefers releasing legolized real life items such as shoes, consoles, globes, typewriters, maps... and I guess sales numbers will prove them right.

we might also be misinterpreting things now and then. black falcons were very hard to get for a few months after release and some people said this would send a message to lego and maybe it did. but we don't how many falcons were actually sold and why they were so scare. maybe lego didn't anticipate them to sell 'well' and instead of 10000 just had 1000 ordered (numbers used for illustration purpose) and kept to that same amount with each batch and the total number of falcons sold is till way too small as to warrant a new castle theme.

 

 

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13 hours ago, TeriXeri said:

Nexo Knight did get me back into LEGO (I didn't collect LEGO from 2001 onward until 2016), but I can see the perspective from LEGO fans that it was a big shift from the nearly constant Castle lines that were produced up to 2013/2014. (with some "weird" variants like Knight Kingdom early on, and some junior-ish early 2000s).

However, LEGO should not try something like that for a forseeable future, especially now that Ninjago and Monkie Kid both have somewhat futuristic vehicles and mechs and both have various types of Monsters to battle with swords and shooters.

Jestro's Volcano Lair was by far my favorite "classic" castle type of set, maybe it's the nostalgia to the Fright Knight Castle I never had, while it might not have been the bastion with a drawbridge or gate, the stairs going around to the top was quite a nice design, and the colors would still easily work as a lava castle in a traditional sense (maybe with the sawblade/monster things removed a bit)

Knighton Castle wasn't bad at all either, Design wise it might not have a very realistic layout but as a playset with an open back, and a courtyard I think the design is still very suited to a Castle, with plenty room to set figures on the ramparts and towers.

The majority of the theme were vehicles however, I think the theme should've had more locations, as even the story did have many areas, from villages, forests, cities, or conceptual sea monsters.

That said, I hope for the forseeable future, Castle and Pirates will stay closer to their traditional roots, and the occasional side theme set like the Viking ship.

 

I did like the Nexo Knight villains, Moltor was great.  Some of the knights armor I have used as enchanted armor for some of my figs.  I did like some of the sets.  My youngest son has Jestro's volcano lair and really likes that set and liked the theme and the show.  

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2 hours ago, Roebuck said:

The new piglet from City has leaked:wub: Time will show if it is in this set :wink:

I don't even care if it's in the castle or not...I'm buying at least 10 piglets :pir-love:

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1 hour ago, GeoBrick said:

Heh, that's quite a cute looking piglet. Next, we need a lamb.:dsweet:

Lamb is said to be coming as part of the city farm wave. But then we need a kid.

I was hoping for a more flesh toned piglet rather than such a vibrant pink. Any of the fresh tones would have worked better.

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13 hours ago, Poco Lypso said:

I believe castle fans are prolly a niche minority. lego prefers releasing legolized real life items such as shoes, consoles, globes, typewriters, maps... and I guess sales numbers will prove them right.

That's not really true, is it. LEGO release many sets that aren't shoes, consoles, globes, typewriters or maps. To me, they prefer to try to reach as big a market as possible and this means that they will release niche sets, especially where they don't do anything else remotely like it in their range and more so if it means another big worldwide brand will cross promote LEGO.

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31 minutes ago, MAB said:

That's not really true, is it. LEGO release many sets that aren't shoes, consoles, globes, typewriters or maps. To me, they prefer to try to reach as big a market as possible and this means that they will release niche sets, especially where they don't do anything else remotely like it in their range and more so if it means another big worldwide brand will cross promote LEGO.

Lol! I didn't say they were only releasing shoes, maps etc, that would be preposterous, why would you even wanna assume that, xD? The context is castle vs. replicas or somesuch. 

If you just take the last 5 years, how many castle sets vs. real life replicas did we get? I am counting 2 castle sets. 

Look, just because I would never buy a lego globe or nes, or the new atari2600, lol, doesn't mean there isn't a market for it. There clearly is! And that market must be huge imo and judging by posts on fb people actually go crazy over them. 

Lots of those replicas are aimed at the adult market imo. I mean which kiddo would ask their parents to get them a lego map (might be wrong here, lol). 

The lego castle community might not be as large as we think it is, only lego knows the numbers and prolly makes decisions based on those numbers, wether its gonna be more profitable for them to create, let's say an advanced and sophisticated castle line, or have their designers work on a real life scale lego bowling ball for example. 

There clearly is a market for medieval sets. Legos competition has been releasing a modular village recently, these sets are nothing else than different versions of the blacksmith shop, but who cares, some people will buy it anyway. Same goes for all the other medieval sets you can get on the internet, people have sets produced in china and sell all over the world. The market is clearly there, the question is, how big is that market? 

The topic of a new lego castle theme has been discussed quite a lot in recent years. And it usually ends with kids these days aren't interested in castle, and adult fans wouldn't like a castle theme designed with kids in mind. Logically an 18+ castle theme could fill that void, but doesn't happen. And my assumption is, that market might be comparably small, compared with harry potter for example. 

 

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3 hours ago, GeoBrick said:

Heh, that's quite a cute looking piglet. Next, we need a lamb.:dsweet:

And calf! All 3 new baby farm aniamls will be in one City set. 

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2 hours ago, Poco Lypso said:

Lol! I didn't say they were only releasing shoes, maps etc, that would be preposterous, why would you even wanna assume that, xD? The context is castle vs. replicas or somesuch. 

If you just take the last 5 years, how many castle sets vs. real life replicas did we get? I am counting 2 castle sets. 

Look, just because I would never buy a lego globe or nes, or the new atari2600, lol, doesn't mean there isn't a market for it. There clearly is! And that market must be huge imo and judging by posts on fb people actually go crazy over them. 

Lots of those replicas are aimed at the adult market imo. I mean which kiddo would ask their parents to get them a lego map (might be wrong here, lol). 

The lego castle community might not be as large as we think it is, only lego knows the numbers and prolly makes decisions based on those numbers, wether its gonna be more profitable for them to create, let's say an advanced and sophisticated castle line, or have their designers work on a real life scale lego bowling ball for example. 

There clearly is a market for medieval sets. Legos competition has been releasing a modular village recently, these sets are nothing else than different versions of the blacksmith shop, but who cares, some people will buy it anyway. Same goes for all the other medieval sets you can get on the internet, people have sets produced in china and sell all over the world. The market is clearly there, the question is, how big is that market? 

The topic of a new lego castle theme has been discussed quite a lot in recent years. And it usually ends with kids these days aren't interested in castle, and adult fans wouldn't like a castle theme designed with kids in mind. Logically an 18+ castle theme could fill that void, but doesn't happen. And my assumption is, that market might be comparably small, compared with harry potter for example. 

 

Why is it castle vs replicas and not castle vs The Muppets or castle vs Star Wars or castle vs plants or castle vs Super Heroes or castle vs space.... there are many themes that LEGO makes that are not castle. That they don't make many castle sets right now suggests that they don't think there is a good business case to make many castle sets right now.

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11 minutes ago, MAB said:

That they don't make many castle sets right now suggests that they don't think there is a good business case to make many castle sets right now.

That's exactly what I was talking about, xD! 

 

 

 

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6 hours ago, MAB said:

Why is it castle vs replicas and not castle vs The Muppets or castle vs Star Wars or castle vs plants or castle vs Super Heroes or castle vs space.... there are many themes that LEGO makes that are not castle. That they don't make many castle sets right now suggests that they don't think there is a good business case to make many castle sets right now.

just came across this vid

 

the market is clearly there, but probably not large enough yet

 

 

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11 hours ago, Poco Lypso said:

just came across this vid

 

the market is clearly there, but probably not large enough yet

 

 

I find them quit expensive for Chinese knock off bricks. The Mocs are not done with genuine lego

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1 hour ago, unclejeffie said:

I find them quit expensive for Chinese knock off bricks. The Mocs are not done with genuine lego

thats very true! as a lego purist, those sets have no appeal at all to me, the lack of minifigures doesn't help either :)

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Raziel Regulus the builder/designer behind the Löwenstein Castle and Official Expansion is now designing sets for Blue Brixx. I see this as a good thing for us Castle fans as competition (and the loss of revenue) may force LEGO to pay more attention to the Castle theme. The Blaustein Castle by Blue Brixx is the type of theme I would like to see LEGO attempt. A large castle that has expansion after expansion added until you get a realistic castle or keep. Side note: In my opinion the rock work below ruins the castle.

105236_2.jpg

 

In the continuing theme of managing our own expectations: The above Castle is sold in four parts and has 1958+4852+5335+4461 pieces.

 

Edited by Follows Closely

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27 minutes ago, Follows Closely said:

Raziel Regulus the builder/designer behind the Löwenstein Castle and Official Expansion is now designing sets for Blue Brixx. I see this as a good thing for us Castle fans as competition (and the loss of revenue) may force LEGO to pay more attention to the Castle theme. The Blaustein Castle by Blue Brixx is the type of theme I would like to see LEGO attempt. A large castle that has expansion after expansion added until you get a realistic castle or keep. Side note: In my opinion the rock work below ruins the castle.

105236_2.jpg

 

 

thats exactly what I am hoping. but it may also backfire on us in that lego will just leave the medieval niche to the competition.

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That's as much competition to Lego as a charity cake sale is to Greggs.

Looking at similar unlicenced sets I'd say around 5000 parts and around 20 minifigs wouldn't be unreasonable. But I'd sacrifice some of either for a few more animals.

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3 hours ago, Agent Kallus said:

That's as much competition to Lego as a charity cake sale is to Greggs.

Looking at similar unlicenced sets I'd say around 5000 parts and around 20 minifigs wouldn't be unreasonable. But I'd sacrifice some of either for a few more animals.

Agreed on the competition.

However, put me down for more minifigs.  I’ll take the animals in city/other sets, but this is where we get the mini figures (new torso/leg prints, colors of weapons, armor, headwear, etc).  That’s what I’m looking for.  I want the money poured into that before even the size of the castle….I end up tweaking/using the parts anyhow.

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