[OFFICIAL] 10320 Eldorado Fortress - Available NOW

[iragm]

The original cost 59.99, inflation adjusted, that's $146.91, so this is a bit pricier.  Has anyone else noticed that Lego's pricing of these remakes (B-Bay, Castle, this) seems determined by the Bricklink price of a used set?

This does look pretty similar to a lot of the Eldorado MOCs on Rebrickable.  That's not a good or a bad thing, it's just a faithful recreation of the original.  But honestly, the design is not as good as what @SleeplessNight has done with Sabre Island and Lagoon Lock-up.  I think I would have preferred one of those more colorful designs.

I slightly prefer @Samarth's cutter (here) to the one included, but this one is quite nice regardless.

This will most likely set the tone of a lot of imperial MOCs for the next 2-3 years, so the choice of yellow instead of tan buildings and black instead of brown for the docks is interesting.  Kind of a shame there aren't more roof bricks included, but given that this is more Eldorado and less Trading Post, I understand.

The modular design is its strongest part and I anticipate a lot of great MOCs that are compatible with this.  I'm already looking to see if I can add a second crane.

And I am drooling about the prospect of buying some of these elements, especially the captain's bicorne, on PAB.

Overall, this is a pretty "by-the-numbers", "play-it-safe" nostalgia-bait set, but unlike the Disney remakes, Lego's offerings DO capture the magic of the originals.  This is a must-buy for me.

[brimbolet]

11 minutes ago, jodawill said:

When I used the slider on the website to compare the versions, I noticed that the new one looks a bit smashed. The original had some great forced perspective. The new one looks a bit like a top hat that someone sat on. I think the highest tower needs to be raised by one or two bricks. Does anyone else have thoughts on this?

At first I had the same impression, but after counting bricks I think there's no height difference. Must be an optical illusion. What bothers me more is that there are no dark red masonry bricks in the walls but plates; the walls look less "solid" somehow...

[dimc]

9 minutes ago, RichardGoring said:

No, I meant that I thought it would have a 2x2 flag with an Imperials print (a scaled down version of the larger one on the fort)

But it's OK not to have that if it's a merchant ship. Although I would have preferred proper merchants on it!

It's nice that it's all nit picking though.

Also, now going to have to go back to the LEGO store and see if they have any more white/black dual moulded legs to give them all boots. I only picked up five a while back, and they're likely going to the crew of the Clipper.

Ah yes, I have a few of those if I feel like they need it. Maybe I should put one of those and one of the red imperial flags in a chest on it, all the better to sail the seas without getting raided...

Perhaps I need to check my Lego store, I do like the boots legs. I haven't done a PAB order in a while, and maybe if the BAM has anything I can turn into sailors, that would be excellent.

[jodawill]

Just now, brimbolet said:

At first I had the same impression, but after counting bricks I think there's no height difference. Must be an optical illusion. What bothers me more is that there are no dark red masonry bricks in the walls but plates; the walls look less "solid" somehow...

Maybe it's just a bad angle in the photo, or it could be that the new one is wider. Whatever it is, it looks a bit odd in the photo. Hopefully it looks better in person.

There are some dark red masonry bricks in the window on the top floor. Check out this full resolution photo.

[HothFan1987]

A little bit disappointing, but also way better than nothing and I’ll buy day 1 to support pirates Lego! 

[_R_R_]

21 minutes ago, jodawill said:

When I used the slider on the website to compare the versions, I noticed that the new one looks a bit smashed. The original had some great forced perspective. The new one looks a bit like a top hat that someone sat on. I think the highest tower needs to be raised by one or two bricks. Does anyone else have thoughts on this?

The picture in the slider comparison seems to have been accidentally widened/distorted, it doesn't accurately represent the new set.

 

Normal set picture.

 

Slider comparison picture.

Edited June 14, 2023 by _R_R_

[Mister Phes]

2 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

There is nothing new to it and it looks rather uninspiring. The

Try looking at this video:

Here's some new elements I've noticed....

• Modular cliff component with leaf pieces
• Tejas curvas (Barrel tile roofing)
• A skeleton
• firing cannons
• A water slide
• A crab
• A wine cellar
• The crane has a wider range of motion and functionality
• Accessories like a barrel, sack, broom

[eldiano]

So we can buy two sets? The second one would pass off as an imperial trading post with that ship 🥹

I heard the Majisto GWP was pushed back to September 

Edited June 14, 2023 by eldiano

[jodawill]

5 minutes ago, _R_R_ said:

The picture in the slider comparison seems to have been accidentally widened/distorted, it doesn't accurately represent the new set.

Normal set picture.

Slider comparison picture.

 

Good catch. The box photo is also just a bad angle. This one is better.

[_R_R_]

3 minutes ago, jodawill said:

Good catch. The box photo is also just a bad angle. This one is better.

As of late it seems TLG is using the best pictures on the back of their boxes instead of the front. 

[dimc]

5 minutes ago, eldiano said:

So we can buy two sets? The second one would pass off as an imperial trading post with that ship 🥹

I heard the Majisto GWP was pushed back to September 

I would totally buy another to build something akin to 6277, especially if it goes on 20% sale. Plus, a second batch of figs is always welcome.

Any source on the Majisto stuff?

[F1stzz]

AIGHT, as my original comment is gone forever and I don't have another 40+ minutes to go through everything in deep, I'm choosing violence here & jumping straight into the hot points.

Minifigures are honestly lame. First of all, why would TLG pick 3626cpb2144 for Governor Broadside's faceprint instead of 3626cpb1335 (which resembles the original character a lot more)? Why there's no new print created for him in the first place (like what's been done in 2020 for Captain Redbeard)? Why did TLG bother to make a "pirate girl torso №9000" & new faces for SOLDIERS (one or a couple of 'em gotta be new, might be wrong), but didn't put a slightest bit of effort into refreshing Broadside's faceprint — the one that was the highlight of the OG set? That's a huge L in my book.

Also, I'm not sure if I'm OK with the new bluecoat soldiers prints, cuz they look more like those sticker prints that could be found in various customs. On top of that, as we've speculated earlier, the army building has just got tougher. With the decision to create a new print for bluecoats inevitably comes the price increase for 2015 designs — same thing with the Imperial Soldiers Flag, btw! Now we have three different designs for the big flag that are going to be pricey down the road, meanwhile the small one isn't even there in the remake! TLG didn't even provide the new design for a smaller flag!

And no, I do not understand why we're getting 3 (if not FOUR — 2 officers, 1 soldier, not so sure on this one tho, & 1 pirate) female characters in this set while there's NO Redbeard (apart from his 2015 faceprint on a random pirate smh...), NO Lt. de Martinet, NONE of these females represent Camilla — I mean, what's up? Is this an Eldorado Wokeness or what? This build doesn't look like a fantasy Disney castle, what's going on?

The space inside the fortress seems to be hella cramped judging by the available info. I also liked the gunports of the original Eldorado — what we're getting here instead is basically embrasures for muskets. Def a thing for me to reconfigure.

Hey, an old school palm leafs! Isn't it cool? Well, if we're keeping the modern tree structure & not bringing the OG joints back — why would TLG even use the older leafs, lol? There's no need to half4ss this part, LEGO.

A remade Trading Boat is making an appearance in this set, and while I'm happy to see it, excited for this new sails design even — I'm simply confused why would they add this ship to the remake of 6276. It has little to no cargo, no merchants to sail it, this ship is taking place of a Dark Blue boat that could've had the aforementioned smaller Imperial flag & actually would've been more fitting to what the original concept for Eldorado Fortress was. No idea why this move was made. Dark Brown boat looks lovely, but why there are no Dark Brown paddles for it?

Not going to mention the colour choices for the main build, there's literally nothing to be disappointed about. Classic palette enjoyers are 100% happy with this set — those who love modern approaches can easily swap those yellow walls & black docks to tan/reddish brown or whatever, there are no extraordinary parts making such manipulations impossible.

I'm giving this set around 6/10 for the first impression. The summary is — love the build (could use some improvements 4sure, thankfully it's modular & all, so options for expansions & reconstructions are pretty much limitless), minifigures are a letdown.

[eldiano]

1 minute ago, dimc said:

I would totally buy another to build something akin to 6277, especially if it goes on 20% sale. Plus, a second batch of figs is always welcome.

Any source on the Majisto stuff?

I’m going to go crazy on PaB with the mini figures, especially on red epaulettes 😍

The Lego discord server members were saying that the July GWP will be Disney related considering the Disney castle remake? Just rumors, don’t take my word for it 🫣

[Marooned Marin]

Nice write up @Mister Phes on the Classic-Pirates.com 

My two pieces of eight regarding this set:

1. Great for pirate-theme

2. I've seen better MOCs here both of Eldorado fortess by @Fraunces (here) and the merchant cutter by @Samarth (here)

[Jack Sassy]

I love it!  At last, a proper pirate set. 

 

I will not buy it on first day because I always wait for discounts. 

[zinnn]

14 minutes ago, eldiano said:

Majisto GWP

what's that?

[dimc]

3 minutes ago, eldiano said:

I’m going to go crazy on PaB with the mini figures, especially on red epaulettes 😍

The Lego discord server members were saying that the July GWP will be Disney related considering the Disney castle remake? Just rumors, don’t take my word for it 🫣

YES to the red epaulettes. I never have enough of them, gonna order about 40 when I can. And maybe more muskets in brown, backpacks, shakos, whatever good castle stuff there is these days, and probably a bunch of minifigs because I have zero impulse control.

Good to know, I guess I'll have to consider a modular or something in September. I don't think I can wait on this...

[Alexandrina]

31 minutes ago, iragm said:

The original cost 59.99, inflation adjusted, that's $146.91, so this is a bit pricier.  Has anyone else noticed that Lego's pricing of these remakes (B-Bay, Castle, this) seems determined by the Bricklink price of a used set?

We do get a bigger set, though - whatever the method they used to decide how big this set would be, we're getting plenty of pieces for our money.

[Sebbl]

This set changes my mind about TLG for the better.
There's so much to like:

• Decent piece count, not a 5000 pieces set again
• While certainly expensive, it is not entirely out of reach
• It captures the charm of the classic sets and keeps the playfulness
• The low number of colors is great for alternate builds!
  --> Build a bigger ship from it if you like!

I fully understand that this is not for everyone.
Since there haven't been real pirates sets for a long time now, this shouldn't be the only one to chose from.
Considering the prices for ship hulls on bricklink, it should be an easy decision for TLG to release a big flagship any time soon.

Of course, you can always nitpick:

• This kills my hope for a new gate mold anytime soon
• Too many tiny pieces, if you ask me. I'd love to see printed panels again.
• Huge holes in the jib topsail make me worry about how well it will age
• And yes, the crane that uses twice as many pieces as it should.

I like the gender diversity. Not only does this loosen up the historically problematic context - some of my all time favorite minifigures are female adventurers, pirates and knights.
What bothers me more are the strong facial expressions.

[dimc]

8 minutes ago, zinnn said:

what's that?

Rumors are of a remake of Majisto's Workshop, similar to how they did the Forestmen GWP.

[Stoertebricker]

Hi, I am somewhat surprised by the comments the set gets, when I remember when the new castle was released, the majority thought it was not close enough to the sources material from the 80s, now it seem the other way round

Form me the thing is ok, I never was a fan of the old one because I did not liked the building configuration and the 45° slped walls. The trading post was so much beterr IMO, but therefore we can open it up and we have the boat! I think it is ok. I dont want to go through all the criteria again. So for me I dont like that they tried to rebuild the 45° solped walls, why not make them round? I think I also would have liked a bit more modern take on it and that they inclkuded the white rowing boat as well, now I have to go to PaB for it... But now I can easily justify to MOC the thing (probably with a 2nd copy) to my own style as I did with the original in my childhood, too!

[Aanchir]

2 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

So after looking at it for an hour i conclude that the set is solely build on nostalgia. There is nothing new to it and it looks rather uninspiring. The castle and Galaxy Explorer were great examples for modern updates of classic sets but everything that makes these sets exiting is missing from Eldorado Fortress. While the white and yellow colors for the walls, together with the splashes of red still look good imo the black of the crane, docks and ship just look wrong. It's nice to see some cloth sails though. But overall the ships looks so simple, it would have been better to not include it at all.

Truth be told, I see a LOT of clever new stuff going on in it. For one, there are lots more subterranean areas like a rum cellar, storerooms with vaulted ceilings, and an escape tunnel from the jail (which leads to a gorgeous looking waterfall cave). The upper areas of the fort are also furnished in much more detail, and even the architecture is improved considerably with additions such as clay tile roofs, a more rounded bartizan, and narrower gunports. The crane has been upgraded nicely with a more substantial boom and a turntable and support beams on the base, which gives it more playability as well as a very period-accurate look. Plus, naturally, the printed textures of the cliffs and cobblestone ramp are replaced with more tactile 3D textures, and even spiced up with some cliffside foliage.

I don't mind the black wooden details, either — after all, it would've been accurate to the setting for wooden ships and piers to be treated with tar to prevent rot. I certainly wouldn't MIND if some of these details were in shades of brown like the piers and jetties from Barracuda Bay, but I don't think the current look is lacking in authenticity. Even that set used black for many wooden details such as its masts and spars (which is part of why I find some of the complaints about the black parts on this set's ship especially surprising)

For my part, what I find most underwhelming are the palm tree designs. While I get that people are nostalgic for the classic palm leaves, a flat-looking canopy made up of big, solid leaves like this feels simplistic by modern standards, especially for an 18+ set like this one. Considering what an amazing job LEGO has done with botanical builds in various LEGO Friends, Ideas, and Icons sets this year, I was honestly hoping to see more innovation in that regard.

But on the whole, I'm extremely impressed, and very eager to see reviews of the set to get a better sense of some of the details that aren't obvious in the official pics and videos — for example, the contents of some of the other subterranean areas, as well as the treasure chests and other containers. I also very much hope the instruction manual includes fun flavor text about the set and characters like Barracuda Bay and the Lion Knights' Castle did, especially since LEGO Pirates has always been the most story-driven of the "classic" LEGO themes.

One detail on the LEGO.com product page that caught my eye is that Broadside's office is described as an "Admiral's office" — not sure whether that's a typo/error, a retcon, or a sign that Broadside has earned a substantial promotion since the classic era! Broadside's design does show some signs of aging, just as Redbeard's did in Barracuda Bay.

It's a bit of a shame that there's no sign of the governor's second-in-command, Lt. de Martinet, but it'd be easy to make a modernized version of him using minifig parts from this and other current sets). Perhaps he could even be included it a future GWP set.

2 hours ago, RichardGoring said:

My only initial disappointment was with the ship showing the coloured flags rather than a small Imperial one. Then realized that it's the ship from the trading post, which is neat. But then it's slightly disappointing that there are no merchants to crew the ship. Otherwise, all good.

I agree, I'd have preferred if the ship were helmed by a non-military merchant character like the original version from the Imperial Trading Post, rather than another naval officer — even if that'd be less suited to "army building".

Also, now that you point out the red and yellow flags, it kind of has me wanting to imagine that this colonial empire originated with the very same kingdom as the Lion Knights from the medieval era, since those are also their signature pennant colors! Just a "headcanon" of course, but I think that's charming to think about.

2 hours ago, eldiano said:

With that said I’ve been obsessing about the lego pictures and realized that this set doesn’t open up, but it’s modular, you can rearrange them like the 2015 sets and that speaks volumes to me, i did MOC’s of the 2015 imperial sets and the Eldorado will make a great expansion to those!!!

Yeah, the modular approach is very exciting! It also has me thinking how neat it'd be to make "updated" versions of other sets like Lagoon Lock-Up/Soldiers' Tavern and Imperial Trading Post/Port Royal that can connect to this one to create a larger harbor town!

Admittedly, a lot of classic imperial builds would feel redundant to combine with this one, considering how many there are that primarily depict jails/prisons like the one this set already contains — but perhaps some of those could be repurposed as storerooms, lock-ups for confiscated goods, treasury vaults, etc.

3 hours ago, zinnn said:

Yup, hence the splash of red on the ship. That could've been blue for example.

I don't think the red is at all out of place, to be honest. In the original Imperial Trading Post, this ship was seemingly a merchant vessel rather than a military gunboat — as evidenced by its sails not matching the crests of either the Imperial Soldiers or Imperial Guards. The emblem on the sails does suggest an allegiance to the crown, but I've always taken that as a sign that the ship is owned by a state-sponsored enterprise similar to the British East India Company.

Anyway, even the Imperial Soldiers used bright red rowboats — including the one from the original Eldorado Fortress that this ship replaced! And for that matter, the Imperial Guards' flagship (Imperial Flagship/Admiral's Ship Sea Lion) had blue lanterns and gunports, and no red at all aside from its cannons, flags, and sails. So there's no reason we should expect even military vessels from these colonial factions to be strictly color-coded.

On the whole, I find the ship quite gorgeous. It makes good use of some of the same parts/techniques that @Samarth used in his rendition, although with the same bright colors as the original ship (in keeping with the way Barracuda Bay stuck with the original Black Seas Barracuda's Bright Yellow accents instead of opting for gold ones). The back of the hull is also somewhat more streamlined than in that MOC, and I'm impressed that it adds a ship's wheel while still leaving ample cargo space. It definitely feels up to the same standard of detail as the BSB redesign, despite the much stricter size constraints and lack of suitable preformed hull pieces!

In the future, it'd be neat to see how LEGO might approach a midsize ship like the original Imperial Flagship and others that shared its 12-stud-wide hull elements, since there's no direct modern counterpart to those pieces. It's definitely something I will continue to explore in MOCs, although I'm sure there are much better Pirates builders than me who'd be far more equipped for the challenge!

[dimc]

6 minutes ago, Alexandrina said:

We do get a bigger set, though - whatever the method they used to decide how big this set would be, we're getting plenty of pieces for our money.

It also had just over 500 pieces. Yes, a lot were bigger (baseplate, walls, jail, etc), but this is 5x as many pieces. Same minifigs. Way more ship, and printed cloth sails.

In the USA, it says $66 MSRP which is $161 now. I honestly feel like with the extra details and ship, it's easily worth the extra amount. Plus, not gonna lie, the crane on my original is by far the thing that falls apart the most.

[sahidko]

Honestly price is really not a problem I have with the set. For somebody (and I understand LEGO can't take that into account) who owns lot of the classic Pirates sets I would rather get something new than such a close modern representation of original set.

[_R_R_]

21 minutes ago, F1stzz said:

AIGHT, as my original comment is gone forever and I don't have another 40+ minutes to go through everything in deep, I'm choosing violence here & jumping straight into the hot points.

Minifigures are honestly lame. First of all, why would TLG pick 3626cpb2144 for Governor Broadside's faceprint instead of 3626cpb1335 (which resembles the original character a lot more)? Why there's no new print created for him in the first place (like what's been done in 2020 for Captain Redbeard)? Why did TLG bother to make a "pirate girl torso №9000" & new faces for SOLDIERS (one or a couple of 'em gotta be new, might be wrong), but didn't put a slightest bit of effort into refreshing Broadside's faceprint — the one that was the highlight of the OG set? That's a huge L in my book.

Also, I'm not sure if I'm OK with the new bluecoat soldiers prints, cuz they look more like those sticker prints that could be found in various customs. On top of that, as we've speculated earlier, the army building has just got tougher. With the decision to create a new print for bluecoats inevitably comes the price increase for 2015 designs — same thing with the Imperial Soldiers Flag, btw! Now we have three different designs for the big flag that are going to be pricey down the road, meanwhile the small one isn't even there in the remake! TLG didn't even provide the new design for a smaller flag!

And no, I do not understand why we're getting 3 (if not FOUR — 2 officers, 1 soldier, not so sure on this one tho, & 1 pirate) female characters in this set while there's NO Redbeard (apart from his 2015 faceprint on a random pirate smh...), NO Lt. de Martinet, NONE of these females represent Camilla — I mean, what's up? Is this an Eldorado Wokeness or what? This build doesn't look like a fantasy Disney castle, what's going on?

The space inside the fortress seems to be hella cramped judging by the available info. I also liked the gunports of the original Eldorado — what we're getting here instead is basically embrasures for muskets. Def a thing for me to reconfigure.

Hey, an old school palm leafs! Isn't it cool? Well, if we're keeping the modern tree structure & not bringing the OG joints back — why would TLG even use the older leafs, lol? There's no need to half4ss this part, LEGO.

A remade Trading Boat is making an appearance in this set, and while I'm happy to see it, excited for this new sails design even — I'm simply confused why would they add this ship to the remake of 6276. It has little to no cargo, no merchants to sail it, this ship is taking place of a Dark Blue boat that could've had the aforementioned smaller Imperial flag & actually would've been more fitting to what the original concept for Eldorado Fortress was. No idea why this move was made. Dark Brown boat looks lovely, but why there are no Dark Brown paddles for it?

Not going to mention the colour choices for the main build, there's literally nothing to be disappointed about. Classic palette enjoyers are 100% happy with this set — those who love modern approaches can easily swap those yellow walls & black docks to tan/reddish brown or whatever, there are no extraordinary parts making such manipulations impossible.

I'm giving this set around 6/10 for the first impression. The summary is — love the build (could use some improvements 4sure, thankfully it's modular & all, so options for expansions & reconstructions are pretty much limitless), minifigures are a letdown.

Agreed on the minifigures, I understand TLG aims to be more inclusive these days but female blue coats don't really fit the lore or the time period and as I mentioned previously female pirates would've been much better. If they really want to go the extra mile there's badass pirate ladies from real life like Anne Bonny and Ching Shih they could take inspiration from, especially the latter which could come on a very exotic pirate ship and bring a new faction to the theme. As far as Governor Broadside I agree the face print seems a bit lazy but it doesn't really bother me at the same time, what I'm currently planning on is replacing the female heads with male ones, using a different head for Broadside and piece together a merchant for the small ship, that is if I don't completely revamp the minifigs with fleshy parts so they can fit my PoTC display.

As far as the built itself I don't have big issues aside from the all black docks, to fix that I will add brown plates on top to give the impression of wooden boards but I will leave the black beams, I feel that will create a nice contrast.