Raskolnikov

If there's one thing that I've learned from this forum, it's that it's never too early -- and the information is never too limited -- to arrive at very confident and sweeping conclusions about how Lego is going downhill, or how Disney is ruining Star Wars, etc. In any event, I very much did get the idea from the trailer that the movie was going to be about a team of rebels, as originally thought. I'm expecting Jyn to be an interlocutor for the audience -- a normal and relatable character who gathers together the more eccentric and eclectic characters of the group, like Forest Whitaker and the martial arts dude. This is storytelling 101 in a fantastical setting. Jyn won't know the other team members -- she will meet them, react to them, and learn about them. And through her, so will the audience. That's the way you build a memorable team, where each character matters (including the one or more that inevitably will die for the mission). Also, I'm just super psyched to see another movie set around the time of the OT -- seeing regular ole' stormtroopers and Star Destroyers on the big screen for the first time in a new story since the 1980s? So awesome.

Thanks for posting "behind the scenes" pictures! The cinematic-looking photography is nice, but I love it when people reveal the overall construction method of a build as well.

There's a picture of one earlier in the thread with an Admiral Piett torso. But there's a new Tarkin head and that hairpiece in the Vader TIE/A-wing set that's coming out. It also will have a new uniform, but in dark tan. I would wait for that or for an eventual dark bluish gray version (here's hoping). I bought a Capaldi Dr. Who on bricklink and was underwhelmed with the results. The Capaldi minifig head does not have any visible cheekbones, which makes it a poor Tarkin head. The Capaldi hair isn't perfect, either, but at least it's a big step up from the old, "ordinary Lego man" hairpiece. I tried a few other heads, but nothing looked right to me. The best older male faces with cheekbones all have brown eyebrows, which look weird. As for gray eyebrow heads, Gandalf looks too nice and his eyebrows are too bushy, and the Magneto face has a gigantic mouth. Also, the whole endeavor isn't really worth it because there is no decent torso to put the head on. The old dark bluish gray Tarkin uniform looks pretty bad compared to more modern Imperial officer prints. The printing of the rank badges and details on newer minifigures looks much sharper and makes him look shabby when he stands next to them. Piett's torso is not strictly accurate, but it has the newer printing and looks decent. That's like a $35 torso, though, which is pretty pricey for an imperfect substitution. So, overall, I recommend just waiting for a new Tarkin. Right now, I use my old Tarkin torso w/ a different head as a local Imperial governor of a system or something, which explains the slightly shabbier uniform -- just can't bring myself to treat it as a true Tarkin. Edit: Also, I just looked Fenom's suggestion of Sabine's hair piece, painted brown, for Mon Mothma, and that looks absolutely perfect. I really hope we see a reddish brown version of that piece soon.

That's a great idea.

I generally like stickers, am pretty good at applying them, and frequently use them in MOCs. They allow you to add a lot of detail that just would not be possible with only printed bricks. That said, the clear ones tend to be trouble. Clears stickers applied to clear panels are the worst offenders, but even clear stickers applied to colored bricks may have issues with visible air bubbles or being able to see some slightly opaque "sticker goop" behind the sticker (especially if you had to reposition it, at all). The clear stickers do tend to have more versatility -- I just wish they looked better.

Of course, that's why space is limited ;) It's attached to a 56-inch ISD that's about 95% complete. I hope to be done in a couple weeks -- just finishing up some of the interior spaces and some of the greebling, so I''ll be sure to show you more then!

No need to apologize, I love hearing Star Wars math. Thanks for the calculation! But now I wonder whether we can treat the Rebels Interdictor as a new class of ship or whether it's just a one-off prototype that may or may not be the same size as any other Interdictors in the canon universe. Shrug. I agree completely, but there's nothing I can do at this point to make it wider in the middle, where the crew "pits" are, because it'd make the "neck" of the ship it's attached to look out of proportion.

Thanks! Is there any official indication of how big the Rebels Interdictor is supposed to be? I know the EU version was 600m long, which always seemed a bit small to me for something carrying "gravity well projectors." Also, I see you picked up the new Superman hair piece. I'm thinking of using that for the captain since it just looks so cool. The guy with the mustache on the bridge is just the ship's XO (despite his resemblance to Pellaeon).

Thanks! Yeah, I did read the tutorial -- otherwise you'd probably have seen a broken link, heh. Do you think the size of the embedded image is appropriate?

Hey guys, I'm working on building a Star Destroyer bridge but trying to keep it very compact. What do you think? I'd be happy for any feedback on the build, although I gotta admit, there's a dual purpose to this post. I just signed up for Flickr -- it seems to be the website to use, around these parts, so I figured I should learn. If anyone has any embedding or Flickr tips, don't hesitate to let me know -- hopefully it'll work alright. (Edit: It also occurs to me, after posting this picture, that this bridge is a bit battle damaged! The large pipe should not be slightly bent, and one control panel seems to have fallen off its stud -- probably a consequence of me working on the bottom of it or something. I guess you really have to pay attention to detail before you take pictures of small builds, huh?) Lego Star Destroyer bridge by raskolnikov268, on Flickr

Although its not too bad, the dark blush gray Tarkin torso seems a little out of place when placed next to newer minifigures. The front printing on the more recent Imperial officer torsos is noticeably sharper and of better quality. The rank insignias on the newer torsos also have a black border that makes them stand out, and the dark bluish gray Tarkin does not. I'm still excited for the new Tarkin figure, though, because I'm always happy to receive new Imperials. I do wish it was in dark bluish gray, though. The color of the uniforms in the movies is a kind of olive gray, and I think the uniforms are roughly the same color in Rebels. I am not convinced by the above pictures that they're intended to be tan in the show. I think LEGO just thought (correctly) that the dark bluish gray is not strictly accurate because the uniforms have more of a greenish/yellowish gray, so they decided to vary it a little and try dark tan with the Rebels versions of those figures, that's all. I just think the dark bluish gray was closer and the inconsistency can be annoying.

I love the few places where there are angular indentations/imperfections in the ice. Using all 3-brick-high slopes would have looked a little too perfect.

The pictures of the built model look pretty good -- much nicer than the digital version. Overall, it is a very nice rendition of the Sandcrawler on a smaller scale.

I'd get very excited about those new Imperials. Hopefully they don't include Jerjerrod, since his rank insignia is a basic 3 red/3 blue squares. But Motti, Tagge, or Bast would add some badly needed new Imperial rank insignias. Motti also would look good in the new Doctor Who/Tarkin hair in reddish brown and would give them another reason to use that mold.

I just created a bunch of black uniformed officers using that torso and the new cap. It'd be nice if there were a male variant of that uniform with some kind of insignia (Juno Eclipse provides a female one), but oh well. Maybe someday. In any event, there are a bunch of "officers" or NCOs, at least, in ROTJ that use that ordinary navy trooper uniform with a black cap and no visible insignia. At the beginning of ROTJ, there's one who says "inform the commander that Lord Vader's shuttle has arrived," and then there's another one later who says "you rebel scum." Although they both have no insignia, they seem to be officers of some kind since they're the ones speaking or giving orders.

Looks really good. I might try to do some things differently with the details, but I think the proportions on this one may be the best I've seen. And the engine should be a standard addition to all TIE MOCs, probably. With the wings, I think there's got to be a way to connect them to the pylons with a long technic axle, using 1x1 technic bricks in the pylons and technic plates in the wings.

The thing with Yularen, though, is the ordinary black pants mod just doesn't look great in person. It's a really stark difference between the pants and white tunic. That starkness is particularly noticeable considering that he's really in more of a beige color, in the movie (In fact, I probably would have preferred a light tan uniform over the white -- I think they chose white so that people could substitute his torso for Thrawn). And since his tunic is more like a suit jacket that goes down to the mid thigh, there should be some white on the top of the legs, so the boots legs sort of represent that. Here's hoping they come out with more booted legs for us purists.

All your figs look great, Fenom, I really like the updated faces that you used. I also like your Yularen, although I'm not sure I'll follow suit since I have a pretty strict rule against modifying pieces. Really tempting, though. I can't wait for my order of batman boots to come in so I can post some of my own Imperials.

Yep, my thoughts exactly. The 9492 TIE Fighter was a great set -- revolutionary, really, compared to Lego's previous TIEs. Now I'm wondering if its worth trying to update things based on some of the newer cockpit designs, like the TIE Advanced Prototype. Have you thought about doing that, at all? Also, are you planning on building yours with bricks? I always like seeing people's TIE collections.

That's what I did with mine, in this post: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=104662&hl=bomber Other than that, I think the OP and I independently made a lot of the same design choices, especially regarding the wings and overall proportions. Interesting and different solutions for the inside of the engines and the flat, greebled bit on top of the pilot's "pod," though. That's a tough shape to make using large cylindrical pieces, since you have to find some way to attach something flat to the smooth side of the cylinder. That part of mine is fairly fragile, and I've been meaning to take another crack at it.

I see possibilities for a tie-in with the Friends line.

Just ordered a bunch, thanks.

The video of the Aqualish/Ponda Baba is very encouraging, great find! I've always thought that we'd eventually get an Aqualish head of some kind that people can use with their cantina scenes, even if it's not officially Ponda Baba. Not a big fan of the Unkar's thug, as I just don't think he looks very "Star Wars," as others have mentioned. I do like the idea of using exclusives like that to "fill in the gaps" of missing figures, though -- the kinds of figures who may not be included in a set otherwise (i.e., Yularen). There's a 100% chance of getting an old Luke eventually, so we really don't need to get it in an exclusive. The RA-7 Protocol Droid that came out a little while ago is not exactly the same, but it's a pretty good 4-Lom substitute.

I'm really surprised at how many have suggested skipping the generator or the ion cannon. Considering all the criticism of it being a "4 in 1 pack," those are the bits that actually were not included in previous sets. I also think they're critical from a playability perspective. Imagine you're a kid with a Star Destroyer set in orbit over the base and Imperials AT-ATs attacking the base. The Imperial objective is clearly to destroy the generators so they can bring their fleet to bear -- that's what your AT-ATs will be moving towards and what the trench is protecting. That's why they're using ground forces in the first place. And the rebels' objective is to escape in their ships, which they are using the ion cannon to accomplish. Without those features, the Hoth battle just doesn't have any internal logic. What is more, those are the only two defensive features of the base (apart from its snowspeeder hangar) that seem to be effective. While we've received multiple kinds of trench turrets over the years, they are never seen to even damage a walker in the films. So if I were a kid (and honestly, probably as an adult), I'd enjoy having my rebels fight to protect that generator form the AT-ATs, while they're using that ion cannon to escape the overwhelming Imperial fleet above. One might argue that it would have been better to offer the generator ion cannon as part of a $90 stand-alone set with the blast door or something, and I won't argue with you there. I would have preferred that rather than being forced to buy another Wampa cave or snowspeeder, both of which I already have and are available on the secondary market. But I still am glad that the ion cannon and generator are making their first appearance.

I'm looking forward to combining it with my other sets. I think I'm ideally situated for a Hoth setup once I get this. I have the Echo Base set, wampa cave, two AT-ATs, and a couple snowspeeders and small trench-based sets. What I need is a blast door, ion cannon, and shield generator -- and that's exactly what this has, along with a pile of somewhat generic rebel Hoth personnel (especially the mid-level staff officers -- others sets tend to have troopers and rebel heroes and not much in between). So this set is really going to fill in the gaps and complete my Hoth collection. I also readily modify sets and am not ever concerned with keeping things 100% complete according to the directions, so I really view this as an invitation to change both this set and my other Hoth sets to complete my ideal Hoth setup. This also could be why I wasn't one of the ones who was terribly disappointed by this set. I mean, we saw this set in a video ages ago, and I've been preparing for it based on what I expected. So I only recently got my Echo Base, used, thinking that I'd need to add to the interior of whatever Lego did. They're always sparse with interiors. I also stocked up on AT-ATs and a pile of snowtroopers, since it never even crossed my mind that Lego would use 1100 pieces to include one in this set. So yeah, I'm really looking forward to the opportunity to mod this and my other Hoth sets. Haha, you can say that again. Nothing makes me regret spending time reading eurobricks more than when the discussion turns to what is or is not a proper use of the UCS label.