[OFFICIAL] Bricklink Designer Program - Series 4 - Finalists Announced

[Yperio_Bricks]

Series 4 Finalists Have Been Announced!

Here be a overview of the finalists

 

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The voting is open for the Bricklink Designer Program Series 4.

You have until February 16th at noon Pacific to vote!

Trading Post by KingCreations

VOTE NOW

Imperial Frigate Concordia by BrickPerfection

VOTE NOW

The Hug Island by BrickyBricks82

VOTE NOW

Imperial Outpost With Island by KingNono

VOTE NOW

Fort Broadbrick (with rearrangeable sections) by Vanestream

VOTE NOW

Pirate fortress by Fehrexplorer

VOTE NOW

SEAGULL BAY LIGHTHOUSE IMPERIAL FORTRESS by DelusionB

VOTE NOW

Imperial Sloop 'Neptune' by Arcturus7

VOTE NOW

Imperial Frigate Minerva by BrickPerfection

VOTE NOW

shipwreck island by Radiosilenced

VOTE NOW

 

[Ruthin Road]

The Imperial Sloop Neptune would definitely be my choice. A clean, elegant and affordable design that is not too big. It is a shame that the flag from the Eldorado Fortress could not have been reused.

[zinnn]

Most of those are a pass for me tbh.

Imperial Sloop 'Neptune' is great but I dislike the brick built sails. It could go well with the Eldorado set though.

The Trading Fort is my fav entry of them all overall.

The Hug island looks COOL, but wouldn't work for me in a larger Pirates set-up. It looks more like a Lego City carnival attraction.

[Yperio_Bricks]

13 hours ago, zinnn said:

Imperial Sloop 'Neptune' is great but I dislike the brick built sails. It could go well with the Eldorado set though.

I don't know the rules, but none of the ship has cloth sails, so i guess they are not allowed. Probably only pieces that are in production at the moment?!

There are some great mocs there. The big ships of course, the trading post, the fortress with the sloped walls.

Hug Island is a cool one but i'd remove the skeleton arms

[thewatchman]

The trading port and lighthouse would be day one buys.

[The Reader]

On 2/6/2024 at 9:11 PM, Yperio_Bricks said:

Fort Broadbrick (with rearrangeable sections) by Vanestream

I like this very much. Cool concept! 👍

[BrickPerfection]

Hi all,

Minerva is a new MOC, designed purposely to fix any issues / criticism that I could gather from my effort for series 3, Concordia. I posted more here:

I did not intend for Concordia to be in Series 4 also; the design was not withdrawn from Series 4 when I asked :(

Because some people commented about preferring one or the other, I made a render comparison:

I think Minerva clearly wins the comparison.
In any case, please vote for Minerva as she is much more buildable - more like a set - and has overall much better chances!

Thanks!

[Mister Phes]

41 minutes ago, BrickPerfection said:

Minerva is a new MOC, designed purposely to fix any issues / criticism that I could gather from my effort for series 3, Concordia. I posted more here:

Everyone should vote for both MOCs anyway

[SpacePolice89]

I have voted for all of the pirate builds and many others. It's amazing to see how many possibilities there are to build different sets for the Pirate theme. I'd love to see them all as real sets. 

[LilUumyz]

The Lighthouse Fortress looks remarkable. 

 

[BrickPerfection]

16 hours ago, Mister Phes said:

Everyone should vote for both MOCs anyway

Well, BDP cannot have two Pirate MOCs selected as finalists! We already have a pirate island from series 2. Time for a ship! There hasn't been an imperial ship since the 2009 Imperial Flagship!

[Mister Phes]

5 minutes ago, BrickPerfection said:

Well, BDP cannot have two Pirate MOCs selected as finalists! We already have a pirate island from series 2. Time for a ship!

The Minerva and Concordia are both ships so voting for both helps increase the probability of one being selected.

[Arcturus7]

On 2/6/2024 at 2:13 PM, Ruthin Road said:

The Imperial Sloop Neptune would definitely be my choice. A clean, elegant and affordable design that is not too big. It is a shame that the flag from the Eldorado Fortress could not have been reused.

Thanks, the Neptune is my build. I was also puzzled why the 6x4 Imperial flag was not a part of the palette despite other Imperial parts being included. The only option would have been to replicate via stickers. That didn't appeal to me, so I opted to keep my originally designed flag. That said, they could easily be swapped later.

On 2/6/2024 at 3:21 PM, zinnn said:

Imperial Sloop 'Neptune' is great but I dislike the brick built sails. It could go well with the Eldorado set though.

It's correct that cloth sails aren't allowed within BDP.  I received similar feedback to my earlier submission and so I made provisions for the easy removal of the brick-built sails and attachment of your own versions (see the 3rd photo from my submission below). 

Have another look and maybe reconsider your vote 

Thanks!

[Mister Phes]

6 hours ago, Arcturus7 said:

It's correct that cloth sails aren't allowed within BDP.  I received similar feedback to my earlier submission and so I made provisions for the easy removal of the brick-built sails and attachment of your own versions (see the 3rd photo from my submission below).  

Any chance of producing a mock up image of what it would look like with sails?

I understand this may be easier said than done because you would have to use software other than BrickLink Design Studio.

[zinnn]

10 hours ago, Arcturus7 said:

Have another look and maybe reconsider your vote 

Don't worry, I was just being picky - I already voted for your design :)

I've also voted for Trading post by KingCreations and both ships by BrickPerfection

The rest is a pass for me tbh.

[Arcturus7]

22 hours ago, Mister Phes said:

Any chance of producing a mock up image of what it would look like with sails?

I understand this may be easier said than done because you would have to use software other than BrickLink Design Studio.

I can't do a software render of this, but here's a rough picture of my test build using basic sails cut from some canvas material I had and attached with the provided 1L tow ball pieces.  (Please don't hold the sail quality against me )

I think a more traditional look could also be achieved using string with end stud pieces (not part of the submitted design).

[Mister Phes]

3 minutes ago, Arcturus7 said:

I can't do a software render of this

It's beautiful!

But now I'll nitpick the background - good that you've attempted to neutralise background distractions, but the texture of that material still distracts from your brilliant work.

 

[MightyThorngren]

I voted for the Neptune, Trading Post, Imperial Outpost and Seagull Bay. My most favorite of the 'base' style sets is the Trading Post, which I absolutely adore. It has all the features I want from an Imperial set to compliment Eldorado.

 

Neptune is just spot on perfect. I want it so bad. A truely wonderful ship for the Imperials, priced and sized for a budgets and shelf sizes. This is a no Brainerd and easily the coolest ship. It pairs perfectly with and is a perfect foil for the Creator 3in1 Pirate ship.

 

But I'd be happy for any of them to make it though. Those two are my most wanted.

 

 

Don't hurt me, but I also voted for three non Pirate themed sets. The Atlantis Sea Base, the Western Town Copperhead-Creek and the Johnny Thunder throwback Egypt Explorer 

Edited March 1 by MightyThorngren

[MightyThorngren]

On 2/12/2024 at 8:22 PM, Arcturus7 said:

Thanks, the Neptune is my build. I was also puzzled why the 6x4 Imperial flag was not a part of the palette despite other Imperial parts being included. The only option would have been to replicate via stickers. That didn't appeal to me, so I opted to keep my originally designed flag. That said, they could easily be swapped later.

It's correct that cloth sails aren't allowed within BDP.  I received similar feedback to my earlier submission and so I made provisions for the easy removal of the brick-built sails and attachment of your own versions (see the 3rd photo from my submission below). 

Have another look and maybe reconsider your vote 

Thanks!

 

Ohh hey cool. I really loved your designed. I posted it up on both Reddit, Instagram and 4chan along with the Trading Post. I'm super duper excited for your sloop, it has basically everything I want from a ship. The design for the canons was pretty incredible. I love that you included a little room inside and hidden area without compromising anything, still managing to add some fun play details. Super rooting for you dude!

[Mister Phes]

Series 4 Finalists Have Been Announced!

Here be a overview of the finalists

 

[zinnn]

Lame results, but once again that shows that we NEED an official proper Castle wave from Lego.

I'm not a fan of any of those winning sets

[Mister Phes]

7 hours ago, zinnn said:

Lame results, but once again that shows that we NEED an official proper Castle wave from Lego.

While I'm certainly not against the release of a proper Classic Castle wave...  (a wave of sets from classic theme would be fantastic, if done properly)

However, I do acknowledge what The LEGO Group is aiming to achieve from a distribution perspective.

Waves of LEGO sets are aimed at children 5-12 years of age and have a general retail release, I.e. the broader market. While, BrickLink Designer sets are aimed exclusively for adults. I.e. a significantly smaller, niche market, which is perhaps too small to generate sufficient revenue at retail in modern times.

So to hedge against potential financial loss, the crowdfunding approach allows The LEGO Group to produce Castle sets (or designs which may not be financially viable at retail) for the AFOL market with a guarantee of sufficient customers/revenue before the sets enter to production.

But that still begs the question; could they use this approach for an entire wave of thematically aligned sets? Or are they lacking confidence that enough customers would buy an entire wave in one purchase?

 

 

[MightyThorngren]

Laaaaaaaame. 

 

Not a single Pirate set, ridiculous with all the good ones submitted this round. I was super duper rooting for that Imperial Trading Post and tge Imperial Sloop Neptune. But gosh, they were all so good. I hope everyone resubmits for round 5.

[RichardGoring]

I really hope they don't rely on BDP for castle and pirates sets. I like a lot of the designs, and the creators are clearly incredibly skilled, but official LEGO sets often provide a very joyous building experience, along with a robustness of model that makes me much more confident when my children are playing with them.

Perhaps most importantly though, as there are no new prints for the BDP sets, we won't get some of the elements - especially torsos - that help to provide greater diversity in the settings. Also, no chance of new moulds to support a wider range of designs, but perhaps wore is the limited parts range the designers can use, so no chance of recolours, or even bringing back out of production pieces, all of which official sets can do.

Still glad they exist. Somewhat disappointed that it seems mostly castle in round 4, but I do like the designs.

[Mister Phes]

1 hour ago, RichardGoring said:

I like a lot of the designs, and the creators are clearly incredibly skilled, but official LEGO sets often provide a very joyous building experience, along with a robustness of model that makes me much more confident when my children are playing with them. 

This is a common sentiment LEGO Pirate fans have towards BrickLink Designer sets...  they saw the wave of sets from the 2022 pilot program and have assumed that's the precedent for all BrickLink designer sets to come.

I.e. they're fan designs, rather than official LEGO sets.

However, from Series 1 onward, finalist submissions undergo a period of refinement in which the designers work with the "Model Governance" and "Building Instructions Teams" to fine tune their creation.

But how this plays out with Ominous Isle and whether it gives the design that sense of official authenticity remains to be seen.