Your impression of the different castle factions

[Runamuck]

I apologize if this has been done before, but I thought it might make an interesting topic.

Even without much fictional materials most castle factions still seem to leave some kind of impression. What I’m talking about here is, do you think their rulers may be evil and oppressive or good and benevolent. Are there any special traits that you assign to a certain faction?

I’ll go ahead and apologize for the large amounts of text in advance.

So let’s start where it all began:

Classic Castle: Not too many personality traits, generally friendly I guess. In general they seem to be a collaboration of various noble families.

Crusaders or Lion Knights: See this is where it gets interesting. They seem to be oppressors of the Forest-men, but they are also the good guys compared to the Black Falcons (even though it is the Crusaders who have all the siege equipment). Their colours would suggest that they are the good guys as both the colour red and the insignia of the lion would be considered heroic, the peasants also seem to be on their side. Judging from their name they probably have a religious agenda of some sort, I guess they would hate magic, the Vikings, the trolls and the undead.

Forest-men: Robin Hood and his merry morons, not much else to say here for me at least. They seem to get along with the peasants very well.

Black Falcons: They always struck me as being rather bland in the personality department. Colours and name would suggest that they are evil, but not much else to support that claim.

Black knights: They are evil because…..uh…they are the Black Knights? Not much in terms of siege equipment, so they aren’t aggressive. Again evil colours, name and insignia, the evil colours are very apparent as they are the first to use black castles.

Wolf Pack: Petty thieves, sneaky, shady, cheating, smuggling thieves. Might be arms dealers too.

Dragon Masters or Dragon Knights: First faction to really use magic and fantasy creatures. They fall into an odd time where it seems to be evil against evil. They use less evil colours than the black knights, especially in their insignia. Armour and helmet design seem very foreign compared to earlier castles. They are more clearly evil when clashing with the Royal knights.

Royal knights: Basic good guys, very proud and noble. Both colours and insignia are clearly heroic even though they use black castles.

Dark Forrest-men: Somewhere in between the old Forest-men and the Wolf Pack in terms of morals. Freedom fighters or petty thieves?

Fright Knights or Bat Knights: The first castle faction that is definitely evil, and not in the darker end of neutral. They use dark colours, their insignia is a creature of the night, they use black magic and worst of all their leader frowns! Very thoroughly evil. Seems to take residence in old run down castles and ruins. Basil The Batlord is differently eccentric, judging from his helmet, may even be a vampire.

King Leo’s Royal Knights: Generic good guys, has a warrior princes.

Bull Knights: An odd faction in the castle line as they have no castle. Evil invaders besieging other castles. They appear to be the first castle faction to really use gunpowder.

King Mathias’ knights and later Jayko’s: The only time when the castle faction actually had a proper storyline as far as I know. Fiction explains the individual knight’s personalities and the general nature of the kingdom. Good guys.

Shadow Knights or Scorpion Knights and other affiliated mercenaries: Aparantly a bunch of brainwashed fanatics. Kind of hard to take serious if you have played too much Command & Conquer, I mean brainwashed fanatics who wear black and red and use a scorpion as their insignia, they must be the Brotherhood of Nod. History detailed in fiction. Bad Guys.

Set 10176 makes no sense.

Vikings: I know technically not a castle faction, but I’ll throw them in anyways. Vikings fighting creatures from Norse mythology. Probably the usual pillage and plunder routine towards the other factions.

Crown Knights?: Generic good guys who try to survive whatever TLC throws at them. Knights in shining armour.

Skeletons: Because their leader looks like Ogel from the old Alpha Team line (and game) I have been using him as a medieval James Bond villain. The “volcano” skull-tower didn’t help that image, come on he is even still trying to create and undead army like Ogel.

Dwarves: Your typical fantasy dwarves, probably good guys.

Trolls: For the Horde! Like Warcraft 1 and 2 evil orcs (you will not look at the Troll warship the same way again after seeing the WC2 intro).

Kingdoms Lion Knights: Generic good guys.

Kingdoms Dragon Knights: Generic bad guys.

So what personalities do you give the castle factions that you use?

[CMP]

I've always thought the Dark Forestmen were outcasts of the forestman, because they tried to keep some of the loot for themselves.

But my mind is really set in the post-KK2 castle. The Crownies are the supreme faction in all the land. The Lion Knights are remnants of the old kingdom, trying to regain power, often has clashes with the Crownies, although both are generally good. The Dwarves have an alliance with the crownies, but it's wavering slightly. The Trolls are pretty much Vikings now, pillaging and plundering. The despise the Dwarves, and by extension, the crownies, and have only slightly had brushes with the Lions. The skeletal horde (5 skellies on horses) are now mercernaries after the destruction of their army and leader. The Dragon Knights are the magic/mythology obssessed knights, rivals of the Lions, and sell weapons to most of the other factions.

[blueandwhite]

I've always found this topic fascinating. Generally speaking none of the factions have much going in the way of personality yet it seems that fans are always trying to brand them. The "Crusaders" for example only received that rather unflattering title during their last years. There really hasn't been anything to suggest that the black knights or black falcons are evil beyond conventional western stereotypes which associate black with something sinister. For years the various factions simply existed. The story was yours to create. There are a lot of folks who don't like it that way, but I was quite happy to have nameless knights and factions that co-existed peacefully.

[Runamuck]

I'm aware that the crusader name is a later one, but is is a bit easier to use that than keep track of the 5 different factions that could be meant by saying lion knight.

Yes, it is a general stereotype for black knights, but the dragon is often seen as an evil creature. I do actually have a hard time seeing the Black Falcons as particularly evil, as they in Danish just are called Falcon Knights or maybe Eagle Knights.

I have a habit of having some factions as archenemies, but otherwise my usual castle setup is relatively peaceful.

[Kliq]

I agree with the majority of the OP except for a few things.

First, the black knights had the most powerful navy of any castle faction, their only rival being Vladek. I believe that was their agression, but I don't think they actively besieged castles. They have small battering ram w/ arrow shield, but that was probably for smaller outposts. They might be a little on the sinister side, but I don't think they were cold hearted.

Second, the new lion knights vs. the new dragon knights of the latest wave. I personally feel their roles are swapped around. There is something about the lion knights that makes me feel they are the rich oppressive nation and the dragon knights have to scrape by and fight for their survival. In doing so, they might have become a bit unconventional and 'bad' (afterall, look at some of their faces), but they had to get tough against the 'handsome' lion knights who feed their king and leave diplomacy out of the question. But I guess when the next wave comes out things might change (after looking at some of those sets...) but I'm sure I'll come up with some excuse for those poor dragon knights.

Third, the original dragon knights. These are a neutral force in my eyes. These are the guys who you want your nation to ally with when it comes to a war with a neighboring nation. Their magic does not look so evil, their armor and equipment give them a sense of pride and honor, and they know the land with their multiple locations.

[Dazmundo]

Crusaders or Lion Knights: See this is where it gets interesting. They seem to be oppressors of the Forest-men, but they are also the good guys compared to the Black Falcons (even though it is the Crusaders who have all the siege equipment). Their colours would suggest that they are the good guys as both the colour red and the insignia of the lion would be considered heroic, the peasants also seem to be on their side. Judging from their name they probably have a religious agenda of some sort, I guess they would hate magic, the Vikings, the trolls and the undead.

Forest-men: Robin Hood and his merry morons, not much else to say here for me at least. They seem to get along with the peasants very well.

Black Falcons: They always struck me as being rather bland in the personality department. Colours and name would suggest that they are evil, but not much else to support that claim.

This we the theme of my youth, I'm just getting back into my LEGO and have started rebuilding all my Castle sets.

I always had the Black Falcons as the good guys and the Lion Knights as the bad guys, don't know why that's just the way it was.

The Forestmen were obviously outlaws with a heart.

D

[beans]

In my set up, my three main factions are the Crownies, the new lion knights, and the dragon knights. Crownies I see as a very monarchical faction (based on their emblem) and are the traditional and highly religious kingdom and command the most power. The Lion knights are comparatively more modern and place more emphasis on education, sort of like the Enlightened faction. The Dragon Knights are groups of converted barbarian tribes (somewhat akin to the Ostrogoths in history). All of them hold onto a shaky alliance amongst themselves to oppose the fantasy 'villain' factions like the trolls and skeletons who have destroyed much of the Dwarven kingdom whose refugees now rely on the human factions for support.

[GMW79]

This is a very cool thread and makes me wish I had more of each faction, rather than just the few Lions and Dragons I have. I'd love to see TLC bring back the Black Falcons and Forestmen in updated colors. Going by the current "generic" factions, the Lions would be good, the Dragons bad, the Falcons somewhere in between, and the Forestmen somewhere outside.

Other potential thoughts that cross my mind: Let's say that the Castle/Kingdoms sets follow a chronology of sorts. What if the Crusaders-Royal Knights-King Leo RK-Kingdom Lion Knights are the same group throughout history?

As for the Kingdom Dragons, they could be the descendants of the Dragon Masters, or at least a faction that is trying to pattern themselves after the Masters of old. (Hence the Green Wizard who is trying to raise a dragon. Maybe the the Dragon Knights are even part of a dragon-worshipping cult. Just ideas...)

Oh, and I definitely see the old Dragon Masters as a rebel off-shoot of the old Black Knights. Why else would the have the same symbol, just re-colored?

Though we didn't have any when we were growing up, my brother and I always saw the Dark Forest faction as a combination of the Forestmen and Wolfpack, comprised of members of both factions who broke away to form a third group. The Forestmen were too good for some, but they wouldn't/couldn't join Wolfpack, and some of the Wolves were just hoping for more power but couldn't get it so the just made their own group and welcomed the former Forestmen.

Any thoughts on the Collectable Minifig Elves? They are definitely a part of the Castle/Kingdom theme... (And I can't wait for the Series 4 Viking to add to my hoard).

Edited January 31, 2011 by GMW79

[Runamuck]

It is nice to see so many different ideas and impressions of the castle factions.

The reason that I call the newest knights generic is that I haven’t formed much of an opinion about them yet, and I only have 4 sets with them yet.

I’m not quite sure how to use the elf yet. I only have one, so he might end up hanging out with the Forest-men or the Crown Knights. My brother suggested that he might serve as a kind of forest ranger, a protector of the woods.

I didn’t include the Ninjas for two reasons: I don’t really see them as a part of the castle, they are something separate for me, they are from the other end of the world compared to all the other knights. The other reason simply is that the Ninja theme seems to be a true mess when it comes to factions.

[Mr. Elijah Timms]

My loyalties put me at odds against you, if only because you doubt the might and will of the Black Falcons!!!

Honestly, though, since I was a boy I've always thought of the Black Falcons as an independent bunch, who trust no one outside their own walls, who never join forces either good or evil, and always put the concerns of their own flag beyond anything else, even the epic fight between good and evil itself. It certainly plays very well against the rest of the factions landscape and if you're ever in need for a wildcard in your 'storyline,' the Black Falcons are always a good place to start.

That, or the Vikings, who in my realm just can't seem to get along with anyone, even if they want to. Great fun!

[fred67]

Any thoughts on the Collectable Minifig Elves? They are definitely a part of the Castle/Kingdom theme...

Here's my thoughts... they're awesome, and a shout out from TLG for disappointing all the castle fans who were awaiting the elves only to have the theme updated to completely eliminate the possibility of getting elves. Remember the map with the elven territory on it? It was the only one missing.

So I'm glad they did it, and it seems like no mistake they waited until after the first year of the new line before putting the elf in the CMFs to let the line get settled.

I’m not quite sure how to use the elf yet. I only have one, so he might end up hanging out with the Forest-men or the Crown Knights. My brother suggested that he might serve as a kind of forest ranger, a protector of the woods.

Quite simple... have more than one. I've got about a dozen so far, and will keep trading for as long as people don't want ridiculous amounts for them.

On top of that, I have many brickforge elf helmets and weapons, and enough heads and variations to make them unique. It's unfortunate to not have an official set, but I won't give up on the LOTR theme.

I didn’t include the Ninjas for two reasons: I don’t really see them as a part of the castle, they are something separate for me, they are from the other end of the world compared to all the other knights. The other reason simply is that the Ninja theme seems to be a true mess when it comes to factions.

It's true they perhaps don't belong in the list of factions (and neither do elves, really), but I will definitely have a faction of Samurai and Ninja as part of my medieval layout (that "some day" dream of having enough space and time to build one).

[DaleDVM]

Interesting topic. I have been collecting since the early 80's and in my LEGO world factions keep evolving over time.

My take on most of the factions are similar to the original poster except where modified below.

Primarily I allign factions based on numbers more than any other factor. By the early 90's I had over 150 black knights and I had to have most of the other factions ally against them for a decent battle to take place. Good guys: Classic Castle, Crusaders, Black Falcons, Forestmen, Wolfpack vs the Evil: Black Knights and Dragon Masters. I also painted some of majistos hats and made wizards of different colors for each of the factions.

Today I have such a large amount of trolls, skeletons, fright knights, and vladeks forces (almost 1500 in total) that I ally most of the other human factions against them.

Currently I am torn where to place the dragon knights. I have almost 200 of them and if placed on the good side they will tip the balance of power to the good side. I always like the good guys to be outnumbered. After all it is more heroic when you are outnumbered. The Dragon Knights appear to be evil with their dark color scheme. The new sets also have them attacking the civilians.

I always took the crownies as a rich merchant and trading kingdom. They have a good alignment but care most about profits. That is how they can afford those gold accents on their castles.

The dwarves are natural allies of the crownies as they care more about gold and gems than anything.

The new lion knights are the epitomy of good guys to me. White, red, and gold accents and possible religious fanatics. I will have all of my lion factions as a kingdom ruled by many different family members of the same royal family.

Edited February 2, 2011 by DaleDVM

[Shroffy123]

I like how all of you placed your factions. I'm impressed with Dale's 1500 minifigs, wow. I only have 300 or so. Nonetheless my is as follows:

Crownies - 32 Soldiers, they are the "Good" guys, the main army against the "evil" factions. They are well-fund through trade with the dwarves, and the far east.

Imperials - 14 soldiers, (no guns, or cannons, only swords and pikes). Allied with the Crowines, they are essentially the naval branch of the crownies.

Dwarves - 8 soldiers, they are allied with the Crownies due to economic trade with them.

Forestman - 9 Soldiers, I consider them Rangers, they are allied with the Crownies. Essentially their scouts.

Hobbits - 8, the Crownies watch over them, they are fighters, carrying rocks and daggers.

New Lion Knights - 21 Soldiers, they are the "Good" guys as well, they share a common interest with the Crownies, but they've not always been close. The great bank is located within their kingdom.

Crusaders - 15 Soldiers, they are led by a lord, subject to the New Lion Knights.

Royal Knights - 11 Soldiers, their Lord is brother to the New Lion Knights King, but is subject to the New Lion Knights.

Black Falcons - 9 Soldiers, they are led by a lord, but subject to the New Lion Knights.

Elves - 13, the "good" and the wise. They ally with the Lion Knights.

Black Knights - 17 Soldiers, they are the "grey" area. They fought with the Crownies, until a new threat emerged.

Dragonmasters - 8 Soldiers, they are subjects of the Black Knights.

New Dragon Knights - 13 Soldiers, they are subjects of the Black Knights.

Persians - 42 Soldiers, they are the largest single standing army. They are located in the far east. Crownies know a lot about them, due to trade. They are wealthy, and strong, but are aware of a growing "evil" threat. Not sure which side they are on.

Vikings - 14 soldiers, "evil" I suppose, just raid and pillage.

Orcs - 30 Soldiers, "evil" allied with the Shadow knights.

Skeletons - 40, "evil" allied with the shadow Knights.

Shadow Knights - 22 soldiers, supreme evil in the land. Through use of black magic have awoken a great evil to take over the land.

Pirates - 11, mercs, only carry about pillaging.

Wolfpack - 9 soldiers, thieves.

Fright Knights - 14 soldiers, they are allied with Shadow knights.

Spartans - 10, not sure where they fit in. I'm still wanting to build them some type of structure ... waiting for the Atlantis set so I can MOC. Strong fighters, I guess mercs.

Edited February 2, 2011 by Shroffy123

[Sirens-of-Titan]

I agree that the kingdoms knights are a bit more generic good vs. bad guys but it feels like LEGO is trying to fill the void that existed for so many years with these sets.

What I mean is, there were tons of good guys, bad guys, fantasy elements, tons of allies and they all came as battle packs or siege weapons and carts, and the quintessential castle element of knights fighting knights was lost. Kingdoms (even the name sounds more subdued) corrects for the crazy crazy sets that existed in years past.

This theme continues into 2011 with civilian sets and almost feels like a "City" theme except in medieval times; no strong story (none at all actually) just a lot of sets to fill niches and ranks for castle builders.

As far as older factions, very few have as developed of a story as Fantasy Era factions, but they borrowed heavily from fantasy fiction. It was as close to Tolkien as you can get without getting a lawsuit on your hands.

I actually have a theory that Kingdoms was thrown in for two reasons mostly:

1) appease all castle fans who weren't into fantasy elements

2) break up the fantasy line so they can restart again with new protagonists and a new land under attack from new foes.

I can almost guarantee (and i am good at this predictions business as my track record shows ) that once Kingdoms has run it's course, we will see something along the lines of "Fantasy Kingdoms" and we will have our elves, new orks, and a brand new human faction. Just you wait for summer 2012.

[SirSven7]

I really Like this thread,

For me I have quite alot of old minifigs with a few new one,

so I have the

old red Crusaders,20

Black Falcons, 23

WolfPack,12

Forestmen, 24

Crownies, 8

New Lion Knights, 6

Dragon Knights, 8

Spartans, 4

Misc villagers, Jesters, Wizards, 12

The way I have my castle kingdoms allied is

Side One

Crusaders, (old campaign troopers, the Lion Faction)

Crownies, (mercenary Branch of the Lion Faction)

New Lion Knights, (new troopers, fresh from the Lion Kingdom)

Side Two

Black Falcons, (Old campaign troopers, Falcon Factions)

Wolfpack, (Hired Thugs, Falcon Faction)

Dragon Knights, (Members of the royal guard, Falcon Factions) (there birds, are Dragons )

The ones with no side

Forestmen, (outlaws, occasional hired troopers, have had better deals with the Lion Kingdom)

Spartans, (Mercenarys for hire)

Towns folk, (under the command of whoever is around at the time)

The way I like to invision them, is that both my set factions are fighting for control of an area of land and the others are just stuck in the middle,

I don't really have good or bad factions (though I agree lego trys to make some side look eviler than others)

But My favorite fact is diffently the Black Falcons and Dragon Knights, I can't believe the size of some of your collections, I am quite envious

Man I just gotta search Bricklink More.

Also I am loving the Black Falcon support on this page.

Go Black Falcons

[Tyrant]

I'm still working out who is allied with who in my LEGO Castle universe. For me the big challenge is explaining why there are 2 Dragon factions and a number of Lion factions. I thought of 2 possible ways to go. MY first idea was (this mainly applies to the Lions) for them to be one Kingdom, but representing different territories. They have a king on top with local governors beneath him and the governors use a variation of the king's emblem (the Lion) to show that they are loyal to the king, but from different territories in the kingdom. My other idea (which might work better for the Dragons) was that they were one kingdom that split in two upon the death of the previous king and now his two sons each rule half of the old kingdom so they have created variations on the dragon design to distinguish their kingdoms and their forces. They may coexist peacefully (could be twins and the king couldn't decide who should rule after him), they could be somewhat hostile (maybe twins again, they fought over who should rule and grudgingly split the kingdom, for now), or openly hostile (they tried to kill each other and failed, so the army took sides and the kingdom split).

Beyond those, I think I will end up with my Undead (skeletons, ghosts, vampires, maybe mummies) and the Orcs be allied. Since I only have a few Vladek soldiers, but I really like their castle, I thought about having them be over run and absorbed into the Undead/Orc army. I've got a vampire figure armored up and crowned to act as the vampire king to rule the undead army. My Crownies will be one faction (likely have allies though) due to sheer size (I believe I have 150 or so Crownie soldiers). The Dwarves are mostly with the Crownies, but I will probably get some more stub legs and beards to put them in a few of the other factions as well. Most of my other factions are seperate entities. My biggest problem is that I don't have a ton of the pre Fantasy figures. Either my Crusaders or Black Falcons are my biggest "classic" faction but I don't think I have 50 of either one. I mixed the scale armored guys and the generic armor torso guys into various factions depending on their color scheme.

So, here's how I break them down in terms of figures and alignment/alliances

Black Falcons-Generic Black Falcon guys, generic armor chested guys (blue chest, blue or black arms), generic scale armored guys (blue torso, blue or black arms). I am unsure where they will fall on the alignment spectrum. I ultimately want a lot more of them to show that they are noticeable military force. I think some of elven armor pieces from Brickforge look good with the Black Falcon color scheme, so I am considering saying that they are a mix of humans and elves.

Crusaders-Old Lion and Double Axe guys (though I have no clue how to explain the double axe guys), generic armor guys (red torso, blue arms), and generic scale armor guys (red torso, blue arms). They are good aligned and somehow allied with the other Lion factions.

Forestmen-Forestmen and Dark Forestmen, maybe the Robin Hood collectible figure as a leader. These guys are basically Robin Hood and his Merry Men. They tend to prefer to fight the evil factions while the good factions turn a blind eye to them. They also oppose the Wolfpack.

Wolfpack-Wolfpack guys, maybe some generic armor guys (black torso, black arms) to represent the better armed members. They are a gang of criminals and former soldiers (maybe some of Vladek's guys who escaped) who have banded together to raid and do occasional mercenary work. They oppose whoever they are paid to oppose, aside from whoever they are raiding at any given moment.

Orcs/Undead-All Orcs, Skeletons (white and black from the Fantasy line, white ones built via PAB with the more evil looking skull, maybe some of the Ninjago skeletons), Ghosts, Vampires, figures cibbles together from bits and pieces to represent liches and a Vampire King, Vladek soldiers (some with skull heads to represent being reanimated), generic scale armored guys (red torso, black arms, skull heads) as bodyguards for the Vampire King, the Red Wizard, other Red Wizard bodies with different heads to represent apprentices, maybe some random figures with zombie and skull heads to represent enemy soldiers that were raised to fight again. The Orc King rules the Orcs with the Witch as his second, the Evil Wizard and his apprentices provide magic (along with the liches) and help reanimate the corpses, the Vampire King rules the whole lot. Orcs and skeletons make up most of the army. At some point they conquered Vladek's territory and killed Vladek. Afterwards they absorbed what they could of Vladek's army. The Vampire King knows they can keep replenishing the army because orcs reproduce fast and corpses can be reseurrected to fight for him, but he's immortal so there's no huge rush. Evil and trying to conquer or kill everyone else. They also have a dragon or two (the newer black and red ones). Collectively my largest army at somewhere over 300 figures.

Crownies-All Crownie guys, some dwarves. They are good aligned and willing to align with other factions, mainly to fight the Undead hordes. They have a dragon (the newer green one). My Crownie army is somewhere around 150 figures.

Dragon Factions-Dragon Master guys, Kingdoms Dragon guys, euro armored guys with visored helmets featuring dragon add ons. They are in a morally gray area because they are enemies of the Lion factions, but not outright evil like the Undead/Orcs. They have a few dragons (the older green ones, not sure about the black ones yet) on their side too.

New Lions-New Lion guys. Allied with the Crusaders, generally good, enemies of the Dragons.

Others I want to try to find a place for but haven't settled on anything yet:

Aliens-Various non human heads from Space Police 3 (that would be put on Castle figures, except maybe Squidman). I want to use them to represent other non human races aside from the Orcs, Dwarves, and Elves.

Sea People-Sea guys from the Atlantis line. They would be a sea based faction (obviously) that would either attack coastal settlements or ships, or use their own ships. Maybe they are a Lovecraft-esque under sea cult (like from the Shadow Over Insmouth) with the squid guys being the leaders.

Crystal Monsters-Crystal Monster guys from Power Miners. These guys would either be monsters that fight the Dwarves down in the mines, or they would launch surprise attacks from underground by randomly erupting through the ground. My modified, 2 headed Crystal King is either their leader or their engine of destruction (or both I suppose). I have about 30 or so of these guys.

Centaurs-These will be made with the custom parts from Brickforge once I get around to buying some of them. I have no idea who they will be allied with. I will either use the torsos of an existing faction for their upper bodies, or some custom ones with their sticker sheets.

[GMW79]

Wow. I'm really sorry to see that this interesting thread has gotten so little attention.

I guess I don't have too much to add for now except for a question: Has anyone else, when trying to make a less fantasy-based Castle MOC or storyline used their Dwarves as Vikings? For a while I replaced their Dwarf legs with regular minifig legs so I could use them as extra, heavily bearded Vikings. The horned Dwaf helms make good headgear for Viking kings.