empiresperish

I appreciate the extension so much, I only saw this a couple days ago and I've been wanting to participate in the forums for a while. I doubt I'll finish in 3 hours but it's been great to build again! Nope not going to make it, I look forward to voting for the finished entries.

I like this and I get what you mean about the modern clips feeling good to click together. I don't know if that translates to an easy con experience. I've been trying to mix Lego and DnD for decades. I never really loved tiles because I don't love repeated printed cobblestone patterns and I never loved full blown 3D plastic tiles because of how restrictive they can feel. Either they're too situational or too repetitive imo. Lego has always felt like the perfect medium since I like to let my players construct minfigs instead of using existing gamestore minis. I've tried similar methods to this and they always petered out when just copying the prefab systems in Lego. Have you experimented with any form of larger standard base with a grid and modules that can be placed on top? Either their own 4x4 or just a standardized grid for walls and specialized ground sections? Might be easier for low parts intensive baseplate system that's already based on multiples of four. With set entrance and exit points your convention goers could arrange their own stable baseplate mazes/corridors/rooms that could be reconfigured when all together. Keeping the very accessible and massable 4x4s would pair perfectly with 2x2 jumpers. A checkerboard pattern of jumpers with alternating 2x2 flat tiles would be very easy for others to copy and customize their own simple 4x4 plates to rearrange on top. You could still use the clip method or pins on edge modules too, or unique offshoots for custom perimeters that don't fit on any of the smaller baseplates of old.

Any love for either of those would be instabuys for me. The characters deserve the deluxe CMF treatment. Treasure Planet and Atlantis both would have made stellar full fledged themes that play right into Lego's specific designs too. Still would, actually, though I'm sure a single large scale set for both would sell well enough to compliment some in a CMF.

Android app works fine for me, but opening it in a mobile browser only shows top posts. I prefer using Chrome but I guess it's a necessary sacrifice to feed my impatience too. The weird way promobricks worded their article I can see a lot of misconstrued reposting of lotr brickhead and the possible D2C in the near future.

I agree these buildings seem much more simple and therefore easily customizable than the previous ones. For good and bad. They aren't as intricate or 'designed' architecturally besides ornamentation. They're pushing the theme back into building as a family and that would be nearly impossible to do with the interlocking roof angles they've nearly perfected, for example. If they had to keep them shallow like city buildings then making them easy to add onto (or duplicate) was a good choice, for sure they feel more like the Creator 3in1 townhouses, and massable unlike before. A lot of the coziness is sacrificed just from the idea to do a downtown section, but the theme has been heavily shaken from its roots before. For my personal use I'm sure I'll find a way to fit them into Hogsmeade like I've read other people plan to on varying sites. So I'm fine with boxy builds to modify into steep roofs and a beautiful tram to keep as is.

I mirror the sentiments of almost everyone in these yearly topics, I've read it religiously the last few years. I am excited at the possibility that the banners have more useful pieces to build up whatever structure they have. The moments had really useful interiors but the covers were not worth the price for me. As a fan of expanding my castle footprint I gutted them, gave them facsimile pages and just displayed them with the real books. Even with the sort of structure like the custom trunk set, at least those are smaller, more normal building pieces. I echo the sense or vision of unfolding wall mounted things. I could see them being a few studs deep, mostly focused on a printed banner crest with really shallow dioramas inside. Dunno, could be worse. I didn't have any delusions that the new line will be in the 2021 modular style like the bathroom or the GWP dorm, though that would have been the best. They seem to really waffle between appeasing collectors and doing whatever they want whether they think it will sell to kids or not. The absence of Hufflepuff moments torsos used to be the most baffling completionist nightmare until the missing Epilogue figures (much more unforgivable). Now with Percy finally existing and getting a custom torso I am slowly switching off from using them as later year Prefect uniforms anyway. I assume we're all still expecting figures based on years 1-2 with a smattering of 3? Especially with the two big sets of the wave being later films? Forgot to add: what sort of mutation shall we expect to give collectors and fans of accuracy a pause? I'm consulting my crystal ball and it says the students will have a giant house crest printed in the middle of their uniform.

I do think a static model is more likely if it's not BP related, however.... Their design philosophy is still the same, regardless of budget or 18+ branding. When I look at the cutaway of the BP Bust and how the shaping is secondary to simple subassemblies attached to a block frame it doesn't inspire confidence of the kind of fidelity we'd want. I can imagine utilizing those semi-new quarter panel city windows would be the first thing they'd try, or the stacked approach like R2D2. ...Or a new 20x20x10 printed dome piece just to avoid the headache. None of those warrant $500 to me, and unfortunately I can't see a complex multi-hinged, multi-axis, multi-piece dome passing any structural or building requirements. My pickiness increases exponentially with every 100 dollar increment, so regardless of what it ends up being I'd hope they put their best effort to impress and push the capabilities of bricks forward (like Browser, actually). I picked up the Hulbuster set for the pieces and ever since Ransom Fern's build is the highlight of my Iron Man display. It would take an unearthly masterpiece to dethrone that regardless of stability or budget differences.

I don't know if a full body Hulkbuster would look as good as I'd hope. I didn't like the approach to the last large one and if even Mark Stafford can't make authentic curves and angles accurate on a huge Black Panther bust, do I really expect Lego to sculpt a domed head with detailed bricks this time around? I'm thinking about their approach to an easily buildable and non-frustrating assembly and the legs/shoulders on the last one. I was joking but I wouldn't be surprised to see a static Hulkbuster bust (that can maybe open to show a smaller, sort of BP-sized Iron Man bust?) The prior microbuild nod to Veronica was nice but I can't imagine a much bigger one unless they include a lot of other medium sized side builds too. I could also see a static Iron Man figure build selling to mass audiences. With the amount of times I've almost bought a Hot Toys figure, a lego version doesn't seem that outrageous. Either way I'll probably only be getting the smaller January Hulbuster since they get better each iteration. I only have the budget for one overpriced $500 dollar set and unfortunately I'm a Harry Potter completionist. I love reading through this topic and how passionate everyone is!

Really long time lurker here, but I had to chime in; everyone has been writing Hulkbuster and no one seems to be preparing themselves for the obvious $500 "Hulkbust."