2maxwell

Hey everyone, I wanted to share some stuff I've been working on. After extensive research, I've attempted to accurately represent portions of the Ottoman army in the 18th and early 19th century. So that this isn't just boring pictures of minifigures, I thought I'd add some blurbs to provide context. Command The man in the dark red robes and turban is an agha. Aghas were the commanders of each individual branch, so there would be a janissary agha, sipahi agha, etc. There were no real uniforms at this level, so this could be the agha of any branch. He wields a mace, a symbol of command throughout Eastern Europe and the Ottoman Empire. The other two figures are the imam, who served as chaplain, and flagbearer. Yeniçeri Ocağı (Janissary Corps) Trained in the art of war from childhood, janissaries were the elite, professional shock troops of the Ottoman empire. Janissaries considered themselves warriors rather than soldiers, relying on courage and skill-at-arms to overwhelm enemies. They refused to use bayonets (a symbol, in their mind, of the automaton-like western soldier) and preferred Turkish sabers like yatağans or kılıçs to complement their firepower. Although this corps of ‘new soldiers’ had become corrupt and largely outmoded by the 18th century, the janissaries' valor on the battlefield (and political maneuvering) kept them firmly at the core of the Ottoman army and state. Janissaries all wore the same basic uniform, though trim and the color of the tunic changed according to orta (regiment). Blue was most common, followed by red and green. The çorbacı (literally soup server, equivalent to colonel) wielded a ladle as a symbol of his station [1]. A bölükbaşı (head of a company, equivalent to captain) would have the same uniform but carried a sword or mace instead of a ladle. I must give credit to Artizan for the idea of using the plastic red capes for the characteristic börk hat. Although less common among Janissaries than white hats, red gives the figures more flexibility [2]. Tüfekçi (musketeers/riflemen) In Turkish, tüfek referred to either a musket or rifle. The tüfek was usually a matchlock weapon, ‘true’ flintlocks being less reliable in dusty conditions, until the gradual introduction of the miquelet variety of flintlock starting in the 17th century. Tüfeks carried by elite units and sharpshooters were rifled, but even smoothbore tüfeks had greater range and accuracy than European muskets, due to their greater length and larger bore. These advantages came at the expense of firing speed. Tüfekçis were disciplined fighters, a step above the reaya and fellahin peasant militias of Anatolia and Egypt [3]. The figures on the right represent Balkan troops in fustanellas such as Greek armatoloi or Albanian arnauts. The figures on the left represent Maghrebi Berbers. The Albanians in particular were considered excellent skirmishers on the European front, while the skills of the Berber Zwawa clansmen would later inspire numerous ‘zouave’-style light infantry units throughout Europe and the U.S. [4]. Topçu Ocağı (Artillery Corps) Like the janissaries and sipahi cavalry, the artillery were kapıkulu troops (literally subjects of the gate, meaning salaried). Known for their massive guns and skill in mining and sapping, the Ottoman artillery corps of the 17th and 18th century were experts of defensive and siege warfare but noticeably outdated on the open battlefield. Unlike the other kapıkulu corps, the Ottoman artillery didn’t resist attempts at reform and modernization, rapidly improving in the late 18th century under French instruction. One type of cannon unique to the Ottoman army was the abus gun, a type of anti-infantry howitzer. Lightweight, maneuverable, and requiring few personnel, the abus gun was a staple of Ottoman warfare. Here I've depicted three topçular (gunners) and a yüzbaşı (chief of artillery) of the Piyade Topçu (foot artillery) manning two abus guns and a şahi [5] field piece, a smaller type of traditional Ottoman cannon. I’ve also included a Turkish tüfekçi in red; tüfekçis were later attached to each bölük (company) to protect the crew and help man the guns. [6] Future I may add to this army over time, but I’m not sure. If I did, I’d likely focus on the elite Humbaraçı Ocağı, the Mehter band (supposedly the first military band in Europe), and a couple cavalry units, such as the Sipahis and Mamluks. Footnotes: 1. Most of the Janissary Corps’s ranks and symbology revolve around food and cooking; scholars have drawn comparisons with crusader orders to describe the janissaries’ spiritual understanding of their role in defending and providing for the empire. 2. The uniform here is also very close to the elite Bostancı Corps (household guards who fought alongside the janissaries on the battlefield), Silahtar cavalry (the sultan's bodyguards), and the Nizam-ı Cedid (highly effective ‘European-style’ line infantry organized in the late 18th century) 3. Sources disagree over whether tüfekçis were regulars, mounted infantry from Kurdistan or Egypt, or an umbrella term for different types of regional, disciplined irregulars. I will be using the 3rd definition (the 1st doesn’t make much sense given the janissaries’ reputation as THE ottoman regular infantry, the Nizam infantry being such a threat to their position that the Janissaries had them disbanded by force. I also suspect that the 2nd is actually just a function of the 3rd) 4. The Balkan torso paired with pants and a fez or turban would also effectively model Bosnian panduks, crack skirmishers who rose to military prominence even before the Albanians, or levends, a type of marine that would also act as irregular infantry in later periods. 5. The translation is not clear here. Some sources have it written as sahi and others as şahi. The former means field while the latter means imperial. 6. Members of the Humbaraçı (mortar) and Süvari Topçu (horse artillery) corps had different uniforms, though it’s not clear if this is true of the Sürat Topçuları (rapid fire field artillery) corps.

They'd work as British rifles like I use here or any hussars. Russians (light and line) and Prussian light infantry wore green jackets, but usually as double breasted jackets rather than this style.

Used the new Boutique Hotel porter torso to make a 95th rifles officer.

The teal jacket from 71735 Tournament of Elements is perfect for a Napoleonic hussar officer. Here's how I'm using it:

Loving these as always! The crocodile guy and the hand is a clever joke. Now that we have Aztec eagle and jaguar warriors, I'd love to see your take on a coyote warrior some day to round out the group.

My era of interest is the long 18th century, particularly 1750s through 1815.

The original B1 molds were really detailed for their time and hold up perfectly well imo. They changed one of the arms, and I think that's about all they needed. The split legs would be great in theory, but with how thin they are it would likely result in very weak joints. Any attempt to match the style of skeletons would make them very wide. And frankly, I don't think they should be making any major updates that makes the two groups of figures difficult to have in the same mocs/arrays when there's so little to gain.

The AAT has such bizarre that it will be a huge challenge to ever create an accurate depiction that can stay up on its own. I'm going to mod the thing heavily, but this is definitely one of those Star Wars vehicles where bickering over dimensions seems silly. For me, this is the correct scale for play, and that's what matters.

Seeing the reviews for that set was pretty disappointing. With its size i knew there wouldnt be a lot of usable space inside, but jeez. Having just the jail cell inside is such a rip off.

I wont say which figure exactly, but someone bought out almost every US Bricklink store of a certain Star Wars figure (that was going for ~$20 new over the last 6 months) and now has 6 of them listed for almost 4x that price. They are now the lowest priced seller of that complete figure in the US. The scalpers are getting out of hand man.

A mini Falcon would take up a huge amount of the piece count. I doubt we'd get that.

What exactly do you feel is Lego's job? They're not providing you a service, where you can say the service has been poor. They provide a product. They can't provide every possible product for everyone that demands it, but they do have the next best thing: a product that is intended to serve as the building blocks for whatever you want to make. They've already done their job in that respect.

The reason is that the original TIE fighters in ANH were only the grey they were due to the technological constraints of green screens at the time. In the later movies, the color was updated to be a light bluish gray. The lego designers were working off assets from the later movie and interpreted the color as being blue, especially in comparison to the much less blue gray they had at their disposal at the time. Although they recognized their error eventually, I think most of the original TIE fighter variants were done in that color scheme to maintain continuity before they eventually switched over to bluish gray for all TIEs.

Even as an OT fan, I think the Lucrehulk is actually much more iconic and recognizable than the TIE bomber.

What's the likelihood that a new UCS quality version of Greedo tanks the cost of the original Greedo with arm printing? I have the original and I've been considering selling it for a while now.

Thanks for this. I'm really frustrated with that big black section in the center. Based on your picture it looks like the section not including the outcropping that supports the cannon is 4 deep, 2 wide, and 3 tall. Really wish something could be done with that space, but options look limited based on what I'm seeing so far.

My inherent problem with these and the main reason I havent bought these MBS style sets is that theyre hard to display for being display pieces. They tend to have a depth that makes it quite a challenge for me to imagine these fitting on a shelf, and most people don't have a full display room with tables to put these on. The cantina seems like it would be even worse from this perspective than Hoth or Ewok Village. If we get a full or 3/4 cantina build with some bit of street in front, I don't think I have a single surface in my home where I could reasonably put this.

Damn, those are the ones I want much more. Ok well, thanks I appreciate it.

Any chance they have white and black ones?

He mentions this in his video on the new Mos Eisley rumors and, while I find it very believable, I would absolutely hate it. If they wanted to make modular sets, they should have stuck to technic pins. Clip based modules are a) never as flush as technic ones and b) short lived because of how often those damn clips break. I feel like I'm replacing all the clips in my collection every year.

I really want to get my hand on the instructions for the AAT. There are a lot of small changes I want to make and it would be so much easier to plan if I knew what some of the specific internals look like.

Don't need an update, but the most recent one is a pretty expensive fig these days. I just want more Dookus in circulation. Plus, the old chrome hilt doesn't fit anymore haha, but that's a minor concern.

What's the likelihood that we get a new Dooku in the next few years? For such an important character it's wild to me that we haven't gotten him for 7 years.

This kind of undersells it. That show was a huge critical and commercial success at the time. It was by Genndy Tartakovsky, a very famous and respected animator. Anakin's custom starfighter was super iconic. True, but I actually think that was a pretty interesting set because it's so easy to understand. I'd never seen a sandspeeder prior to the set but as soon as I saw it I was like "oh, its a snowspeeder adapted to a different environment. cool!" I thought that was a great set because it took something super iconic and changed it enough to be interesting but not enough for it to become to foreign to consumers. I assume at least, since I have no idea how it sold. Anyway, none of that changes that I don't understand why the new game isn't getting sets. I remember when The Force Unleashed came out, there was a ton of hype and fanfare surrounding it. The trailer for it is super famous and I still remember most of it. I admittedly was kind of out of the game scene when Fallen Order was announced; was the hype/marketing on a similar scale?

We were never going to get 3-4 in a $15 set because Lego would be dumb to throw away money when fans have been literally begging for the chance to buy this lol.