The Community Castle Build Contest

[Sir Dillon]

It was a time of desperation, a time for pulling together. The King, sensing the fragile disposition of his subjects and the fracturing alliance between the Alpha and Beta factions, called for the construction of a fortified city. In this new city, townsfolk could not only dwell securely, but also freely trade and negotiate with the opposing faction. The King evenly divided the land between the factions, and charged each with the duty of constructing many wondrous dwellings, embassies and places of business.

Welcome to the Eurobricks Community Castle Build Contest!

Come take your place amongst your fellow Eurobricks members by constructing your own portion of this fortified city. The rules required to take part in this challenge appear below.

The contest will run for 8 weeks, from Friday, February 6th through Friday, April 3rd. The deadline may be extended if deemed necessary, but no entries will be accepted after the final posted deadline.

Each entry must adhere to module specifications as detailed below. Each module must be built on a 16 x16 surface, either one 16 x 16 baseplate or multiple smaller plates equaling 16 x 16. (Colour of the base does not matter, though light grey, green, or dark grey are preferred.) SNOT bases are not allowed. Small overhangs at the front and back of the modules are allowed, but overhangs on the side is not permissible, as this could keep modules from connecting correctly.

- Only unmodified, authentic LEGO brand parts are allowed, with these exceptions.

o You may use custom decals on mini-figures or flags.

o You may use non-LEGO string, and may cut official LEGO string, pneumatic tubing and flex-tubing as needed.

o Custom minifigure accessories such as

Brickarms

,

Brick Forge

, Little Armory, etc. are allowed, but keep in mind that this is a castle themed competition.

- Each entry not inside the castle keep (

see floor plan

) must have a wall on one of its sides, similar to the one in the images below. The wall must be built in primarily light grey or light bley, but you made add windows, mottling, or other designs as you see fit. The height of the wall must be close to or exactly the size of the one pictured.

- Each module may be no higher than 25 bricks, in keeping with the general theme of fortification behind castle walls.

- There is no piece or minifigure limit.

- Digital entries will NOT be allowed.

- All entries MUST be

new creations

that have never been displayed anywhere before the start of this contest.

- Each contestant may submit up to two (2) entries. This contest is open to any member, regardless of rank, number of posts, etc.

- Entries from staff members will not be included in the main competition and prizes, but instead will be placed into their own category, in which they will compete against each other, with the winning entry to be decided by the community in a poll. Staff members are encouraged to include either a booby trap or a cow catapult into their entries, but it is not required.

Staff is defined as official members of the Eurobricks staff and does not include anyone with a non-staff rank, such as Classic-Pirates volunteers, Fellows, or The Reviewers' Academy teachers. Entries by the judges will also be included in this category.

Winners will be determined by Sir Dillon, KimT and I Scream Clone.

The judges' decision is final. Rules violations may be mentioned in the discussion thread, but there is no guarantee. Entries with rules violations will be disqualified. Please try to avoid any violations by reading the rules carefully, and by asking in this thread for clarification regarding any rules which you don't understand.

We have two threads devoted to this contest, an [entry thread] and a [discussion thread]. Each entry must be posted in the entry thread to be considered eligible.

You may present up to five (5) pictures of your entry. In accordance with Eurobricks guidelines, the maximum picture size is 800x600 pixels . Entries with bigger pictures will not be accepted. If you need help resizing or displaying images, review the tutorials [here]. You may link to an external gallery with more pictures, but only the chosen five will be used in judging.

If an entry violates the guidelines set by Eurobricks in any way, it will be removed.

I Scream Clone has generously donated three castle impulse sets (5615 x2, 5618 x1), to be awarded to the top three entries as chosen by the judges.

Update: BrickArms has now graciously offered to provide the winners of the contest with a variety of new Castle BrickArms accessories in several different colors. Hinckley will also donate some Brickforge items as prizes.

The EB Community Castle Build has been running for about 5 months now. The two teams, Alpha and Beta, who were building separately, will now be working together on the same city. When you enter this contest, if you're not already a member of either team, you will be assigned to one. At the end of the contest there will be a poll to decide which team had the better contest showing.

To inspire you, please view the existing Medieval Modules and list of possible modules in the Community Castle Build Thread. Feel free to attempt one of these, or another of your own creation, as long as it is Castle based.

The judges reserve the right to change any of the rules as they see fit without notice.

[Sir Dillon]

Make sure to thank I Scream Clone, not only for donating the prizes, but also for writing most of the rules. Also thanks to Thrash for creating the banner.

[Erdbeereis]

Yay, the contest is official!

Sounds excellent, and thanks a lot Sir Dillon, ISC, Thrash and anyone else involved. I'll have to order some gray from Bricklink....

[Zepher]

This looks fantastic! Can't wait to start building!

[Ricecracker]

Yes, finally a reason to participate in the ECCB! Can't wait to see others entries, and Thank you very much to ISC, Sir dillion, Kimt and Thrash!

-Ricecracker

[Erdbeereis]

Yes, finally a reason to participate in the ECCB! Can't wait to see others entries, and Thank you very much to ISC, Sir dillion, Kimt and Thrash!

-Ricecracker

So you're saying there was no reason before?! Having fun isn't enough for you?

[Ricecracker]

So you're saying there was no reason before?! Having fun isn't enough for you?

Ever heard of the word laziness ? If you look it up, you'll see a picture of me.

[Brickthing]

This contest sounds like a great incentive to amp up the module making (Alpha, I'm talking to you ), but why aren't digital entries allowed, provided they use only pre-existing pieces?

[hewkii9]

I'm in! Should've joined this earlier actually

For our entries, do they have to fit a specific module on the list or can they be anything within the parameters?

[Thrash]

Yay, the contest is finally up and running! Guess it's time to take apart my Tavern and get back to building modules. It's gonna be tough deciding which ones to build, especially since it has to be limited to only 2!

I was wondering how you guys would handle the larger modules when it came time for the contest. I think it was a good idea to leave them out and just focus on the 16x16 modules.

Thanks Sir Dillon and ISC for getting this together.

~Thrash

[I Scream Clone]

Alright, the comp is off and running so get building one and all and once submissions are made you will join a team.

This contest sounds like a great incentive to amp up the module making (Alpha, I'm talking to you ), but why aren't digital entries allowed, provided they use only pre-existing pieces?

Well no digital entries allowed as all previous creations are made IRL, so seems unfair to all the previous builders who had limitations on their collections yet were able to contribute great creations nonetheless.

I'm in! Should've joined this earlier actually

For our entries, do they have to fit a specific module on the list or can they be anything within the parameters?

Either, as mentioned in the rules, choose from the list or make your own as long as it is Castle themed.

[Ak-47]

If its on the list, does it have to be available, as in not being worked on at the moment? This sounds like a ton of fun.

~Ak-47

[Erdbeereis]

If its on the list, does it have to be available, as in not being worked on at the moment? This sounds like a ton of fun.

~Ak-47

I believe that you can make any of them, even if they have already been made. Glad to hear you'll join the fun!

[Huntleyfx]

Count me in as well! My forces have been needing a base to operate from.

[I Scream Clone]

If its on the list, does it have to be available, as in not being worked on at the moment? This sounds like a ton of fun.

~Ak-47

Choose any 16 x 16 module you wish. You can submit two entries each rememeber

Count me in as well! My forces have been needing a base to operate from.

Exxxxccccellent!

[Dragonator]

So I take it that the larger modules cannot be entered in this contest? Ah well, I'll have to see if I can build a 16x16 model as well, although the front gates are going to keep me pretty busy!

There's no chance of perhaps splitting this into size categories is there, for example a small category for the 16x16 modules, and then a large one for all the rest? Just a thought.

[Lego12]

Oh, I'll have to try this! Thanks for donating the prizes ISC. Seems like a great contest. Good job ECCB.

[General Armendariz]

This will be a great contest! But I was wondering, what are the prizes?

[Thrash]

So I take it that the larger modules cannot be entered in this contest? Ah well, I'll have to see if I can build a 16x16 model as well, although the front gates are going to keep me pretty busy!

There's no chance of perhaps splitting this into size categories is there, for example a small category for the 16x16 modules, and then a large one for all the rest? Just a thought.

That might be a cool idea. Even if they don't want to have any prizes for the large category, it would still be fun to let people vote on which or the large creations is the best!

But I was wondering, what are the prizes?

To answer that:

• I Scream Clone has generously donated three castle impulse sets (5615 x2, 5618 x1), to be awarded to the top three entries as chosen by the judges.

Also, in case someone wanted a smaller banner of the original or some other ones for alpha and beta...

~Thrash

Edited February 7, 2009 by Thrash

[Erdbeereis]

Thanks for the banners Thrash!

Now I can prove that I'm on Team Beta Alpha!

[I Scream Clone]

Thanks again Thrash for the banners, I will change mine now hehe

So I take it that the larger modules cannot be entered in this contest? Ah well, I'll have to see if I can build a 16x16 model as well, although the front gates are going to keep me pretty busy!

There's no chance of perhaps splitting this into size categories is there, for example a small category for the 16x16 modules, and then a large one for all the rest? Just a thought.

Well the whole idea was to get everyone on the same size for the contest, though I guess I could mention it to Dillon. I do have a spare Impulse set I could throw in. I know its not a huge prize pool, but its about all the cash I have as we are moving house at the moment

This will be a great contest! But I was wondering, what are the prizes?

Looks like you pay as much attention to rules as I do when I enter contests As Thrash said, 2 Knight and 1 Orc impulse are up for grabs for the three best entries.

Remember you can submit two entries each, so you could theoretically get two prizes

[Thrash]

Thanks again Thrash for the banners, I will change mine now hehe

No problem, I think I'll be changing mine in a minute too.

~Thrash

Edited February 7, 2009 by Thrash

[Brickthing]

He did it again!

[Erdbeereis]

O.K., who changed my signature?!

Why oh why must you toture me? This was not my doing!

EDIT: Now we're talking!

[hewkii9]

A question -

For the wall segment in my entry, can I have there be a gaping hole in it? The hole would be self-contained within the module and the connection points would still be there.