L-DI-EGO

[LDD MOC] Invisible Hand

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Hello, EB.

I spent more time reading than posting in this forum, but today I would like to show a LDD MOC that I have recently made.

The idea began in 2009, when the summer wave of STAR WARS was already known, including the Venator set. Taking on consideration that set and the 6211, I supposed that TLG was planning to release a CIS ship to confront the clone cruiser.

At that time, I though the Invisible Hand to be the best option. There are several scenes from Ep. III that happen inside this ship and have not been immortalized in any set.

Then I planned how that possible set should be; I consider my idea nearer to a prediction of a set than a proper MOC.

That’s the reason because I have posted the final model as a project in LEGO CUUSOO’s site. Of course, I don’t want to spam EB asking for supporters; but the MOC has been almost unnoticed in that site and I think that it could reach a better appreciation here.

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Like the 10188 Death Star, there is a playable interior showing each scene showed in the film.

The ceiling can be removed to reveal the ship’s hangar. It includes sliding doors, two storage boxes, a crane and elevator’s entrance.

That elevator communicates with the highest zone of the ship, the communications pod where Palpatine was held captive. The roof from this zone can be lifted, showing the chair to put Palpatine.

The elevator also communicates with a small room behind the engines.

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The other middle of the ship has space for a flak gun, a corridor (where Obi-Wan, Anakin and Palpatine are captured in the movie) and General Grievous’ Escape pod.

The brick arched in front of the capsule and the flak gun can be hinged for playability issues.

And, of course, in the front of the ship can be found the last room that can be seen in the film, the command bridge. A pilot droid or a normal minifig can sit in the chair.

Taking again the 10188 as a reference, I have included two small ships with enough space to accommodate a minifig: the ETA-2 Actis-Class Jedi Starfighters owned by Anakin and Obi-Wan. They also can fit inside the flagship’s hangar.

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The project also comes with a Vulture Droid on an intermediate scale that lets him interact with the mini starfighters and the minifigures at the same time. And can turn into walking configuration despite is small size.

The idea was to add with the set any character who appears in this part of Ep.III. That’s why the project set comes with a large amount of minifigures:

-R2-D2

-Commander Battle Droid

-x2 Security Droids

-x2 Pilot Droids

-x2 Super Battle Droids

-x2 Magnaguards

-General Grevious (Ep. III variant with cape)

-Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ep. III variant, with headset)

-Anakin Skywalker (Ep. III variant with headset)

-Count Dooku (movie version)

-Chancellor Palpatine (movie version)

-Lushros Dofine

-Buzz Droid (New design)

-Droideka (New design)

-R4-P17 head (in Obi-Wan’s Starfighter)

The droideka was a figure that I included at the last minute, and I must admit that I am satisfied with the result.

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This version of the destroyer droid it’s nearer to the minifigure scale than the official ones. It also can be turned in wheel configuration.

Thanks for your time, I wish you like the model. Any comment is always welcomed. :classic:

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That's amazing L-DI-EGO!!! I really like your creation. I think it's more real than the LEGO Venator...

Congratulations for this fantastic MOC! :classic:

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Hello, L-DI-EGO! I had no idea you were still active in LEGO. But the perceived hiatus is more than justified by this absolutely marvelous creation!

I'll comment briefly on each of the individual areas of this impressive playset design:

The hangar is nicely tiled over and wonderfully decorated! The design for the bay doors is clever and effective

The communications tower is simply decorated but perfectly functional. The use of the large transparent piece to represent the window behind the Chancellor's chair is perfect! The elevator looks to be well-integrated and unobtrusive. I love the placement of the harpoons at the rear of the tower – there simply is no shortage of detail anywhere.

I am similarly taken with the engine room, which is also simple but welcome as a play feature nonetheless!

The hallway is a great inclusion and critical to the playset, as is the escape pod – perhaps you could even include a top hat for Grievous to act out this scene. :laugh:

The MIDI ships, which could be standalone MOCs, complete the set. :wub: They're instantly recognizable and every bit as functional as they need to be. The vulture droid in particular as a great little model with all the playability of the one from 7660.

The droideka isn't the best, but it rolls up and is far closer to minifigure scale than The LEGO Group's have ever been. I love the use of the snowshoes and knives. The same goes for the buzz droid with its skeleton's foot and pickaxes.

Lastly, the exterior itself is beautiful and makes a great display model, complete with stand. Shaping and colors are as on par as playsets go, and the unusual fatness is perfectly excusable given the marvels within!

Given the size of and amount of detail on this creation (not to mention the number of minifigures) this would easily surpass 10188 in price; as such, the chances of this becoming an official release as it is now is slim, but I'm certain that if released, it would make a fantastic playset and a valuable AFOL collector's item. :thumbup:

While I'm still here, allow me to also take a second to say that the LDD X-wing in your Brickshelf folder, which you shared on Eurobricks some year and a half ago) is groundbreaking in the techniques used in shaping the forward fuselage (you've executed the critical hexagonal cross-section of the nose with a significant degree of success). I recall you saying on the Flickr page for Psiaki's X-wing that you had a revised edition in the works - is it complete yet? Being the X-wing fan that I am, I was definitely impressed with your rendition, stability issues aside, and would be interested in seeing further progress.

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Thank you for your comments, Linko and fallenangel309. :sweet:

[...]Given the size of and amount of detail on this creation (not to mention the number of minifigures) this would easily surpass 10188 in price; as such, the chances of this becoming an official release as it is now is slim, but I'm certain that if released, it would make a fantastic playset and a valuable AFOL collector's item. :thumbup:

Thank you for your appreciations about my model. Yes, the price ratio would be around the Death Star set, the lxf. file has more than 3800 bricks. :look: If the project will become a set, probably LEGO would change the design as they have already made with previous CUUSOO projects, with the purpose of making the model more affordable.

While I'm still here, allow me to also take a second to say that the LDD X-wing in your Brickshelf folder, which you shared on Eurobricks some year and a half ago) is groundbreaking in the techniques used in shaping the forward fuselage (you've executed the critical hexagonal cross-section of the nose with a significant degree of success). I recall you saying on the Flickr page for Psiaki's X-wing that you had a revised edition in the works - is it complete yet? Being the X-wing fan that I am, I was definitely impressed with your rendition, stability issues aside, and would be interested in seeing further progress.

I already knew that you are a big T-65 fan, but I never suspect that you were interested in my work. :oh:

Yes, the new LDD file is already completed. But the new version is completely different; I wanted to solve the stability problem with the nose, and the hexagonal shape of the underside had been lost in the process. However, I have also corrected some errors from my old model, like the separation between the wings and the size of the central body, which is now smaller.

I have also change the main colour scheme to white instead of light bluish grey.

I haven’t published anything yet because I want to make a proper presentation of the model with real bricks. I haven’t been able to purchase the pieces yet, so I really don´t know when will be completely finished. :sceptic:

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Wow! This really great, great work! How many bricks are in this set??

Cheers

Morten

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Thanks!

As I have said before, it has more than 3800 bricks; being more specific 3.883, including the minifigure elements, the vulture droid and the small jedi starfighters.

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I already knew that you are a big T-65 fan, but I never suspect that you were interested in my work. :oh:

Yes, the new LDD file is already completed. But the new version is completely different; I wanted to solve the stability problem with the nose, and the hexagonal shape of the underside had been lost in the process. However, I have also corrected some errors from my old model, like the separation between the wings and the size of the central body, which is now smaller.

I have also change the main colour scheme to white instead of light bluish grey.

I haven’t published anything yet because I want to make a proper presentation of the model with real bricks. I haven’t been able to purchase the pieces yet, so I really don´t know when will be completely finished. :sceptic:

Yes, the shaping of the fuselage and nose has been a fix of mine for the longest time, and because of this, yours quite stood out. I had been getting somewhat close when yours demonstrated a brilliant yet at the same time oh-so-obvious solution (fragile though it was). I've since tried other ideas, some of which have also made their way to some really awesome people (and I'm really just self-plugging at this point, but what the heck), and the prospect of seeing further innovation excites me.

So in short, yes, I am very much interested in your work, because your work is amazing. :grin::thumbup:

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Thanks again :blush:

The use of the clip pieces for the SNOT was precisely what made my model so unstable. My current version uses techniques that are closer to an official set than a great MOC. Maybe you will prefer the old model. :laugh:

I will try to be fast obtaining the pieces to make the real MOC. However, I can't give to LEGO all the time I would like, so you should be patient. Very patient.

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Very impressive LDD rendition of the Invisible Hand L-DI-EGO! I agree that the overall design certainly looks much better than the system-scale starships that TLG has released and I personally would like this to become a set. But then reality kicks in, and as FA pointed out, the main limiting factor that will prevent this from becoming a real set is the high piece count, which is a shame considering how good of a digital model this is. I don't know if the piece count can still be significantly further reduced/optimized though I feel if ever TLG releases one in the future it won't be as good as this one whether it be system-scale or UCS-scale (the price-parts restriction won't just allow it). But that doesn't take away the sheer fact that this is still a fantastic LDD MOC. :thumbup:

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I'm kind of lost for words to describe how awesome this would be as a set L-DI-EGO. The amount of playability and functionality included is much better than TLG Venator set. As a suggestion I would remove at least one of the JSF's as well as Lushros Dofine, Buzz Droid, Droideka, the pilot droids and the commander droid to lower the price a bit.

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Thanks again for your comments. :sweet:

And thank you KielDaMan for blogged the MOC.

[...] As a suggestion I would remove at least one of the JSF's as well as Lushros Dofine, Buzz Droid, Droideka, the pilot droids and the commander droid to lower the price a bit.

I wanted to include a large number of minifigs because I think that this is one of the most appealing features in the current sets, and it’s also one of the main features of the 101888.

It´s true that the minifigs would increase a bit the price, but some of them are droids made of common parts. However, I must recognise that Lushros and the commander droid are the less necessary characters in the set. :grin:

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Cool LDD MOC, L-DI-EGO! I love the way you've made the ships smaller than minifig scale, just like the 10188 Tie Advanced!

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Wow amazing job!

I mean there already are good Invisible hands, but they have NO functions or play features at all.

Your solution of design/ playability is mind blowing- I mean this because I know how hard it is even catch the proportions of CIS ships….

Personally, I love the idea of hangar/fighters/minifigure scale. Going to support this immediately... TLG please take this project seriously :cry_happy:

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I didn’t want to resurrect the topic after such a long time, but I updated the digital model some days ago.

I must say that changing the model wasn’t in my plans, but the amount of people interested on it gave me enough feedback to think there was room for improvement.

At this point The LEGO Group could have their own version in the works, so I want to set the bar high. :tongue:

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The idea is the same, but almost every brick in the design has been changed.

The main purpose was to reduce the piece count.

I have added also some play features. There is a complete storage floor beneath the hangar, and the ship can be separated in two parts.

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I have even created an UCS sticker design.

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More pictures in my gallery.

Thanks for your time. I hope you like all the changes. :sweet:

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Beautiful work. Still flabbergasted it's not a real LEGO set already. Based on the piece count, what do you think it would retail for?

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Amazing creation. I like the engines and how big they are and the bridge/control area. I also like how you made the interiors accessible with the flip roof. An amazing amount of figures too.

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That looks much more sleek and streamlined. :wub: Especially the bridge and the nose; less blocky in this new version.

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Oh man, I first saw this back when you uploaded the idea on cussoo and I was so amazed. I really hope this gets through with lego making no changes because they would probably be negative ones, good luck on getting 10,000 supporters soon.

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Oh yeah, much better than the original! I am suprised I haven't commented before now as I noticed this months ago. Yo don't happen to have the ldd file for the Jedi Interceptors do you? They are brilliant! Of course I've supported! Good luck!

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