anothergol

For some strange reason, 26047 (1x1 plate+bar) now in LBG!!! It's not to be found in any set yet, but perhaps it's from the Ninjago city docks, and thus it would be interesting to check if the new 1x1 brackets are available as well, but that would require to know their part #, maybe someone here knows?

I have to credit Brickdoctor for the use of an inside-out tire there, even though ideally it should be 2 bulges instead of one in the middle, but I don't think there's any tire of the right format for that.

Thanks!

I'm afraid not, things have to fit quite precisely around there. There are things you can mix&match, like feet/legs/body/head, also the back plate of the head. Other than that, no.

Has anyone noticed B&P orders shipped in several parts now? My next-to-last order was shipped in 2 batches, and my last one has already shipped twice for just a couple of parts & lots remaining. Not sure if it's sent from different factories or they do that to reduce delays. Most likely different factories, because the first batch was a bunch of new parts that they gave me for free because they don't have a price yet (pretty cool when Lego does that). That batch had LBG rollerskates & "pointy 2x2 plate" found in the latest Tie Fighter, and an LBG bike frame found in set 10759. Perhaps these now have a price & can be ordered. Also, the 29119/29120 (1x2 curve with cut) in LBG have been buyable by phone for months now, I've already bought those 4 times. Not sure why it's still not buyable directly on B&P. Edit: oh, LBG rollerskate is now buyable on B&P directly, but in its alternate 18747 number. 27928 & bike fairing (alt number as well: 31582) listed but not buyable.

So, almost 3 years later, and after 1000's of edits, version 2.5. https://flic.kr/s/aHsmbpf8vL With LXF on Rebrickable (sorry, not free): https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-14608 Tweaks everywhere but a major redesign of the sides of the head.

You bought 2 of your own pictures?

I still think it's terribly wrong to compute a minifig scale according to a minifig height. I still believe the key is the size of the head. Minifig is often estimated to be 1:42 based on height, but if you put a minifig next to any 1:48 model kit of vehicle or person, it feels extremely wrong. I believe the correct scale is around 1:30, and if you put a minifig next to a 1:30 person, yes it looks like a kid or midget, but it doesn't look out of place. I had made a little comparison here, with Bandai's 1:48 AT-ST. Granted it's 1:48, not 1:42, but the wookies really don't feel like they're the same scale at all. And again, I believe it's mainly from the size of the head, because the features of a face is what we go directly for, what we recognize instantly, that you mainly judge the scale. Another point of comparison: in "realistic" anime, when a character sometimes goes chibi, he scales down. If he wasn't, if his height was preserved & he was just getting chubby & cute, he wouldn't look right. I don't know how tall this AT-AT is, but if you think it's too big to be minifig-scaled, it probably is minifig-scaled. Most important is to keep it consistant & have all vehicles in the same scale once you've picked one, though. I know my AT-ST is around 1:30, I still believe it's the most fitting for minifigs, even if they look like midgets around it. When you start playing with the articulation of an AT-ST, you quickly understand that you can't tell "the height of an AT-ST", I wouldn't even know what's the normal/resting pose of an AT-ST. I don't know of blueprints with measurements, though. And who even knows if the scale is consistant through all of the shots in the movie, they may not have cared that much afterall. (but Bandai probably got the metrics right from better sources than us)

About that 29119 I've been waiting to see in LBG again, me happy! (well, in a month) Even stranger that this is one set that could have used the existing DBG cut slope instead, while an LBG one would have spiced up several other sets that have been announced.

Hi, nothing is holding by gravity, everything is attached. Assuming you're talking about the old v2 that's old Rebrickable, are you talking about the Snowspeeders? The wings are on a clip, clip is on a bar, bar is on another round clip held by the roof jumper & the 1x2 grill above it. It's not held underneath, it's only held by the jumper. So yeah it's fragile, but it's all legal connections (except for the AT-AT's head guns that shouldn't be pushed fully if you don't wanna damage them). Oh & no problem resurrecting, I'm actually done with the next version & I plan to make it available, as soon as I can get my parts printed (still trying after a whole year I see. I have all the artwork done for 30 parts).

not here, but it'd be weird considering each has its specific long ID number. But missing parts or lots, not rare at all for me.

As for easiness & speed, you want auto part snapping, thus LDD or Stud.io. Stud.io is promising, but not there yet. Mecabricks is by far the hardest, but it's the one with the best render & the latest parts. Stud.io has a nice render using POVRay, and new parts are hard but possible to hack in. My setup is LDD & Stud.io for rendering if needed. LDD has recently proven not being abandonned, but yeah, do expect 1 part update/year. That's a downside I'm afraid. I don't believe that Stud.io has a chance to get profitable, because BL integration is just a gimmick IMHO. LDD had the same intentions, afterall. I just don't believe in a "press this button to buy all the parts", it's always more complex. So IMHO it's less risky for a tool to be maintained by enthousiasts. Also it seems that its dev has slowed down or something. I've been thinking that Stud.io was "not there yet" for quite a long time now, but the little quircks are still there. I'm not expecting Stud.io to ever get any physics or flex, because that's anything but a detail to add, but I would like things like LDD-like mouse & kb controls. Like the possibility of the same mapping for easy migration, moving the camera slower & more friendly, etc. Transparent in Stud.io means that there is a physical collision somewhere. You can turn it off, but better find the collision & fix it.

While I don't see how BL has gone downhill, I'd say you probably support Lego more by buying some key parts like that one on BL, since the seller had to buy a full set to get it (probably at half price, though). It's also important for transparent parts like that one, most BL sellers protect them, Lego doesn't. But ok, they got it from a set in which it wasn't protected either. They will tell you upfront if it's scratched, though. I'm glad there's B&P to get the best price for recent parts, and I'm glad there's BL to get the best price for common parts, and to get old parts.

They aren't new & are easily found on BL. As large parts, they will always be cheaper on BL anyway. I would also suggest buying light bricks on BL, 2-3eur average new, nowhere near 5eur.

Yes that's pretty much the problem, it means that Mecabricks will never get autosnap because you don't believe in it. It's pretty rare when LDD's autosnap is lost, it's generally a matter of moving the camera around, and it's pretty fast at that too. What LDD is bad at, where it requires a lot of wasted time, it's when you need something aligned more precisely than its smallest moving unit, and you have to trick it. In that regard, Mecabricks or Stud.io are superior. But that's rare enough, and the ideal is to have both. It's not about being "powerful", even though, as a programmer, the LDD amazes me, it's not the kind of tool in which I expected to see physics for bending wires & all. It's really about speed, and Lego isn't like 3D. In a 3D editor, if you want this cutout there, you just do it, you cut through the poly's, and you're done. With Lego, you've got to try dozens of arrangements of a lot of parts to get the best approximation, that's a lot of parts to snap together just to try out stuff that aren't even gonna be used in the final model.

Getting used to it is one thing, but how are you adding/connecting parts without autosnap, as fast as in the LDD?

Oh it's not that I don't understand, I've used 3DS4 and then 3DSMax a long time ago (more for animation than modelling though). Things would be very different if the LDD didn't exist, but it does. Moving parts around is what you do the most, when you design a model. I've probably done it like over a million times. I just can't imagine doing that without autosnapping, & the LDD does it just perfectly. Stud.io does it ok, but Mecabricks doesn't do it at all (or you have to select a source & target, but well..) I wouldn't critisize Blender for being overcomplex, because it's a generic tool, it has to do everything. But for a specific tool like a Lego designer, IMHO the #1 feature to have is autosnapping, since it's the thing you do the most, by far. And yeah, perhaps as an introduction to CAD for kids, it makes sense. Not sure, though, because every editor has its specificities. I mean, having used 3DS hasn't much helped me struggling with Blender. Sure Blender is less friendly than 3DS anyway, but it's not just that. Even though I know some features must exist somewhere under some form because I've used them in 3DS, finding how & where is key, and what I had troubles with. And of course every shortcut is different. So I don't even believe myself in "an introduction to CAD" because 3D modellers are so complex that learning one hardly teaches you another. Sure, for kids to learn the very basics, why not, but Minecraft probably already did that. Yes as I wrote I've tried that. Right now I use Stud.io like that, & I find it easy enough for just that task (so far), but Mecabricks, even fixing/adapting the model (even just to add the parts that don't exist in the LDD yet), I hated it.

I have a recent order that shipped within days, while I too have a 1-month old one that has just shipped (in 2 parts for some reason). But you shouldn't complain, I think even back in early March Lego was making it clear that they had delays. They didn't make it clear what was the nature of those delays, though. If it's for orders that contain some specific parts, it makes sense that some orders went faster than others. Here I'm waiting for 18747 (rollerskate) & 27928 in LBG, also the motorbike shell in LBG. Judging by my last call, they aren't available yet.

Really the opposite for me. While I hate how the LDD lacks updates, and I hate how the it doesn't offer some "no collision/free placement" mode, I love how fast it is. But I don't remember if I've tried LDCad. Its archaic UI doesn't really invite me to. I have hopes for Stud.io, not there yet in terms of usability, but its UI is lovely. (& then there's Mecabricks for the true masochists) I only wish that the LDD was made open source by Lego, so that parts can be added more quickly, or replaced by HD ones. I would reaaaally not worry about that. You have to understand that Lego is a big company, they leave lawyers care about all those terms. And that's what lawyers do, they push as far as they can, for maximum safety. I'm even quite surprised that they aren't stating that anything you make in the LDD, becomes the property of Lego, because that's the kind of thing they do. If it was legally acceptable for a TOS sheet, they would probably add that they own your soul. The TOS for Lego's contests are quite abusive as well. But here again, it doesn't matter, it's just what lawyers do as their job. I've won some prizes there. "Legally", Lego owns my stuff now - I've signed that. But it doesn't matter a single bit, Lego isn't really gonna steal my stuff, and they don't need to, I've only signed legal crap that every business does to protect itself. So yes, quite obviously you can sell LDD files, many do just that. Which.. doesn't even really matter anyway, because you won't find anyone to buy them. I can't imagine the average MOC instructions selling more than a dozen, in the hundreds at the very best for the top ones -maybe-.

Here's my opinion, for what it's worth: I'd agree that Mecabrick's rendering is by far the best out there, it nearly looks like it's there with real parts. But I wouldn't use it. I've used Bluerender (fast, thus great for animation), POVRay (generally from Stud.io). I've *tried* Mecabricks several times, but I found it really, really awful to use. I come from the LDD like most people. I don't find Stud.io the most friendly either, in fact I'd find it unusable (so far) to build stuff from zero, but I found it usable enough to import stuff & mess with it before rendering. Mecabricks, sorry, even the basic fixing steps I haven't managed. It's sad because, again, it has the best rendering, and it always has the latest parts. With the LDD you're stuck waiting for Lego to update the parts. You can add new parts to Stud.io but it's always a hack. And Stud.io has no tube bending & stuff. I'm not coming with a solution, though. I think Mecabricks is so far from the LDD that I can't even imaging it coming close one day. But I can't imagine your rendering plugged directly to an LDD file either, without little things to fix. And well, perhaps some people find it usable enough. Perhaps when you come from a classic 3D editor it makes sense. Oh, I'm also not a fan of the pay-to-render scheme, especially when I see I render a dozen drafts to get to the final one. I don't even think rendering should be done online anyway. From your POV it's great, because it protects your stuff (no piracy possible). But I also don't think there's much money around, in the MOCing world, as there's pretty much no commercial use for Lego renders, except for Lego itself. Still, it does make sense. Stud.io's business model is around Bricklink - makes sense, but not there yet. Yours is around rendering - makes sense since it's what Mecabricks really does best.

Round plates don't have a plate-thick axle hole, though, it's only at the end, so generally you need to stack 2. Trust me, 2 1x5 bars with just 1 axle should be way sturdier. Of course brackets will work as well, but keep in mind that brackets are rather poorly molded, I don't really trust them when it comes to getting perfect joints. Brick brackets can be trusted, though. Brackets with flat sides are nasty. 1x2 ones are even less precise than 2x2 ones. Brackets at the bottom & at the top will do fine, you will only see the gaps around the brackets themselves, not a problem when it's inside.

Good find with the puking face (6123728), because the listing shows the boring side of the head, I missed it. (meanwhile my 1-month old order has finally been sent, except it too says "in warehouse", only because the last 4 lots were supposedly not included. Pretty weird)

It's violent, so there is approximately zero chance you'd ever see Lego linked to that :) I'm afraid we're not gonna see anything non-SW until the next Benny's spaceship (especially since the next movie is rumored to be very space-related). Perhaps Xingbao will do those things that Lego never will.

I've used this in some places, but if you have the room I'd also suggest this one on each side, its axle hole is full & very sturdy. Sturdy enough that you will only need 1 or 2 of them on each side.

Ah, totally! I see Lego Fabrik indeed offers those (& some other interesting ones). At 9eur for 100g, that makes those tiles at around 2 cents, quite a bargain, considering Lego is still sitting on my 1-month old order in which I paid 22 cents each. At the same time, they got to pay their ticket, and were limited to 100g..