Pandora

It's time to vote in the Summer of Friends Building Contest! Use the following links to see the entries to the various categories and cast your votes: Category 1: Vehicles Category 2: Rooms Category 3A: Cross Themes 16x16 Category 3B: Cross Themes 32x32 Category 4: Animals Please read the voting rules carefully! Voting closes on Friday 14th of September at 23.59 GMT/UTC. Voting Rules - You may vote once in each category - You have a total of 5 points to award - You may not give more than 3 points to a single entry - Post your votes in the voting format shown below (list entry number, builder, and number of points awarded) - You may not edit your post, edited votes will not be counted - Votes that do not comply with these (simple) rules will not be counted - Only post your votes here, for discussion please refer to this thread - You must have joined Eurobricks prior to August 31 2012 to be able to vote Examples of Correct Votes Only votes in this format will be accepted! 7. Phred - 2 19. Hinckley - 3 7. Phred - 2 15. Ricecracker - 2 19. Hinckley - 1 7. Phred - 1 15. Ricecracker - 1 19. Hinckley - 1 21. Pandora - 1 22. Rick - 1 The Entries - Category 2: Rooms In no particular order. Click on the entry's picture to see more. 1. Marie's Bricklink Office - mordatre 2. Garden Room - slovakiasteph 3. Emma's Bedroom - Kai NRG 4. Emma's Garden Room - Kristel 5. Andrea's Bedroom - gurusql 6. Emma's Bath House - SilentMode Good luck to everyone!

It's time to vote in the Summer of Friends Building Contest! Use the following links to see the entries to the various categories and cast your votes: Category 1: Vehicles Category 2: Rooms Category 3A: Cross Themes 16x16 Category 3B: Cross Themes 32x32 Category 4: Animals Please read the voting rules carefully! Voting closes on Friday 14th of September at 23.59 GMT/UTC. Voting Rules - You may vote once in each category - You have a total of 5 points to award - You may not give more than 3 points to a single entry - Post your votes in the voting format shown below (list entry number, builder, and number of points awarded) - You may not edit your post, edited votes will not be counted - Votes that do not comply with these (simple) rules will not be counted - Only post your votes here, for discussion please refer to this thread - You must have joined Eurobricks prior to August 31 2012 to be able to vote Examples of Correct Votes Only votes in this format will be accepted! 7. Phred - 2 19. Hinckley - 3 7. Phred - 2 15. Ricecracker - 2 19. Hinckley - 1 7. Phred - 1 15. Ricecracker - 1 19. Hinckley - 1 21. Pandora - 1 22. Rick - 1 The Entries - Category 1: Vehicles In no particular order. Click on the entry's picture to see more. 1. Mia's Monster Truck - InsaneJames 2. Stephanie's Motorized Monster Truck - TheKingOfBuilding 3. The Friends Monorail - Kai NRG 4. The Friends Funny Flowers Train - Trijntje 5. Mia's Pet Grooming Van - ZetoVince 6. Mia's Friendly Flick-Fire Missile Carrier - dr_spock 7. Horse Trailer and Pickup - Pencil_42 8. "The Misery Machine" Apocalypse Scooby Doo! - Hammerstein NWC 9. The Friend Ship - Oky Good luck to everyone!

Anyone on EB is free to post reviews; there are no restrictions at all. The Academy strives to improve the overall quality of reviews posted on Eurobricks, and offers teaching and tips in photography, review structure and written skills, and is a voluntary programme. The Heroica game is open to everyone. The Heroica index is a good place to start. You have to sign up for quests, and may only post in them if chosen, but every so often someone will host a quest designed for new starters and low-level questers.

A zoo! A zoo has been on the Town wishlist for a long time, so maybe now it will be realised within the Friends line. I really hope so.

Ok folks, as of this post I have a record of all the (fantastic! ) entries in the various categories in the Summer of Friends Building Contest! Any entry posted later than this post will not, I'm afraid, be valid and thus won't be considered. There will be details about voting appearing soon, but in the meantime I would like to heartily congratulate everyone who has entered; I've been looking at the entries and although I've abstained from commenting, I've been overwhelmed by the standard of entries. They've been posted far and wide around EB, not just here in Town, so have a good look around and see if there are any you've missed. There will be a full list available when voting opens, though.

Number – 30102 Name – Desk Theme – Town Subtheme - Friends Year – 2012 Minidolls – 1 Pieces – 22 Price – Received as a gift; Available sealed on BrickLink for £3.13 - £8.41 (€3.95 - €10.62; $4.96 - $13.34) As Summer of Friends winds down, I thought it would be fitting to share another Friends review (or possibly two, who knows?) and there aren't many items or sets from the Friends range that haven't been reviewed yet, except a couple of the polybags. This was very kindly sent to me on my appointment as Friends Regulator, and I've been saving it for a rainy day (just like my VIP points). Unfortunately I live in Britain, where we have a large number of rainy days, and given that this looks like a cute little set, I took the opportunity to crack it open and see what was inside. Links: Brickset, Bricklink, Peeron -not listed, LEGO Shop@Home - not listed. The Polybag The polybag front is light, bright and colourful, as one might expect. The Friends logo, colourscheme and indeed the Friends themselves are there for all to see, clearly marking this out as a Friends product, and making the bag look very appealing as a whole. The picture focuses on the desk by having it as the one item of furniture in the room. The difficulty is, I guess, that filling up the room with LEGOy furniture isn't possible - as they'd have to be included, and filling it up with non-LEGOy furniture... isn't very LEGOy. The pot plant is a case in point. It looks nice and adds detail, and without it the room would look even more sparse, but it also looks a little cartoony. Overall we're better off with it than without. It seems, going by the view though the window, that Olivia lives opposite the Parthenon in Athens. Or possibly underwater in Atlantis. The back is a large splash of lavender, and I'm so glad they chose that colour for this line, as it's infinitely easier on the eye than pink. The booooring (yet compulsory) safety information is seemingly kept to a minimum, and there's one of those 'actual size' pictures for Olivia. The LEGO Friends website is highlighted in a pretty blue and there's a sweet butterfly too. I've said it before, but I really do find the Friends packaging design both eye-catching and appealing; some good choices were made with it. Contents When you pour out the contents of the polybag, there isn't all that much, but then it's a little polybag so there won't be a thousand parts in here. There are, as I said at the beginning, 22 parts (26 if you count the minidoll parts) which is actually a small number when cross-referenced with the CREATOR polybag 30026 Panda which had a whopping 62 pieces. However it's not the number that matters (entirely). Here there's a bright and colourful range of useful pieces. The friends colours are well represented, with bright and dark pink, medium azure and, of course, lime green. The other pieces are handy - the trans-clear minifig head and the laptop are great parts to get, along with the printed 1x2 bright pink cellphone tile. The dark pink cup, pearl gold telescope, trans-dark pink 2x2 dish and plant/flower parts are also very handy additions. For such a small number of pieces there's actually a great variety of colours and interesting parts. The Instructions You may have spotted the folded up instruction paper in the contents picture. Here you can see it unfolded, and that the steps are very straightforward and clear. The first step is always to make the minidoll, but you can see the desk is pretty much done by the end of this first side. You can also make out the pretty lighter purple decoration in the background of the instructions, and it's very subtle and gentle, and doesn't interrupt the instructions at all. Like I said, the build is pretty much done by the end of the first page, so there are only a couple of steps on the second side. This, naturally, leaves ample space for a series of adverts for some of the Friends sets from the first wave, with their handy tick boxes to check off when you've collected all the sets. The background to the adverts harks back to the background of the boxes of the sets, being the darker lavender colour with the stars, hearts, flowers and butterflies motifs. It's all very pretty. The Minidoll Olivia is the same Olivia from 3315 Olivia's House and 3184 Adventure Camper. It would be too much to expect that Olivia have a new outfit solely for a polybag, but I still can't help but be disappointed. She still has the unsettling orange eyes, although I really do like her flowing brown hair. Her outfit, although not new, is pretty enough, and it's nice to get minidolls in these Friends polybags. The Build Well you've seen how simple the build is, but it still ends up pretty. The colours of the medium azure and pink shades work nicely together, and Olivia has a decent sized desk with pretty details and lots of accessories. The laptop would have been more exciting had it not turned up in the Series 7 of the CMFs, but actually it is really appropriate in depicting a modern girl at her desk. The use of the trans-clear minifig head as a vase is not a new idea, but still a nice idea. You can see the 'vase' a little better here, and you can also see the simple, yet effective, construction of the lamp. In between the telescope and dish pieces is the 1x1 round trans-yellow plate that makes the light of the lamp, and although not completely visible, is a nice detail. The stool is simple and has been seen before (in 3185 Summer Riding Camp) but it's sweet and adds the lime green colour to the set (even if I'm not much of a fan of lime green). Olivia is fully connected with the modern world - she has her laptop and her mobile phone/MP3 player to hand, plus some pretty flowers (in a nice contrasting yellow, not pink) and a mug of hot chocolate (presumably; she's far too young to be drinking coffee). Conclusion Design: 8/10 There's a really nice harmony of colours here, and they are intrinsically Friends. The desk isn't elaborate, but nor is it boring, and the use of the dark pink arches and medium azure 1x1 round bricks make it interesting without being garish. Adding in the vase and flowers is the nicest touch, to me, and once more I'm glad that the flowers themselves aren't pink. The colour palate is used carefully, giving a harmonious model, with mercifully not too much pink or lime green. Parts: 9/10 This is a great little parts pack. There may not be very many pieces here, but all of them are interesting and useful. There's a wide range of colours, and I will still be excited by the laptop and the trans-clear minifig head (despite the fact that it's not that rare). A good selection overall. Minifigs: 8/10 I should be grateful that this has a minidoll, as it's only a small polybag, and really to acquire Olivia any other way involves buying relatively large sets. With that in mind, I feel it is unfair to be grumpy about the fact that she doesn't have a spangly new outfit for this small polybag set, and her presence helps give more context to the desk. Build: 7/10 Absolutely and completely a non-challenging build. It's remarkably simple, but that doesn't mean it's not fun. It's too short to be boring (but also too short to be really interesting), however you can still be satified by adding the details to the desk once it's built. Short and sweet. Playability: 7/10 Now this may well depend on whether you have any other Friends sets, really. It strikes me as a companion set to the buildings and bedrooms that have already been released, and so works really well (and is thus extremely playable) in that context, but as a stand alone set, I'm not sure. I can see girls relating to it as an aspect of their daily lives and something to project onto, and they might well have it set up as part of their play, but inherently all Olivia can do is use the computer, talk on her phone, listen to music and drink from her mug. And maybe arrange her flowers. Ok, so maybe she can actually do a bit with this small set, and it is quite playable. It is, frankly, infinitely more playable with Olivia in it. Price: 7/10 The minimum price is still pretty high, and I've not seen this for sale in any LEGO brand shops or other toy shops. The balance is that it's a small set with some really nice parts. I really do think it's worth it, if you can get it for somewhere near the lower end of the price range, but at the highest end, it's far too expensive. Overall 77% This is a cute little set that can help flesh out your Friends environment and add something many AFOLs seem to want - furniture. The parts selection, although small, is provided in a good variety of the Friends colours and with interesting pieces. Having Olivia available in a smaller set is good, both for the acquisition of Olivia, and to make more sense of the set itself, and she has plenty of accessories with which to interact. If you can get your hands on one of these little purple bags for a reasonable price, than I'd say it's well worth it. Olivia should probably be doing her homework, but in fact she's looking for all the latest news on Eurobricks.. ..or possibly playing Mafia Thank you for reading, comments are always very welcome. High-Res pictures can be found on my flickr account.

And as a result of that outburst, I have my eyes on you. and a nice new pair of heels and maybe some new lipstick I've been reading your accusations of Horace, his responses and your further, rather tenacious accusations, and I must say I found his responses quite reasonable and you seem to be trying to piece together an accusation out of any old thing that will fit. This does sound to me like you were just looking for something with which to accuse Horace. And by colleagues at the docks, do you mean your fellow scummos on the scumboard? In the argument between the two of you, he's coming off better. I vote: Maurice Mouse (Cecilie)

(Posted here to avoid too much OoC in the Quest thread.) That sounds like an awful thing to have happened, and of course we understand. As a side note, Ru and I will be away for about 24 hours (or maybe just over) from tomorrow morning. We should be able to check in and post at least once, though.

Nyx giggles as Lorenzo makes his flamboyant introduction, and just about manages not to blush. "Yes, I'm Nyx, and you sir are definitely a charmer. I can see us having a lot of fun on this journey. Don't think I haven't noticed that you still didn't say anything about getting us back here, but I'm sure we can.. discuss it more when we're at sea. Shall we go then? Anyone else have anything to say?"

Yes there is some hesitation, but not because of the janitor action, but more because people are bringing forward their own thoughts and ideas, which can only be a good thing. Speaking of which.. I would agree with that, but perhaps we should also look to Gordon, our bug-eating gorilla, who is intrinsic to the points you make above, and yet has been far less vocal and opinionated today than on the previous two days. Almost like he's a different person... Of course I would hold your purses, that would be the gentlemanly thing to do oh don't worry about me I have my own dress hihihi Of course not, that would be silly it's sewer grates I'm more interested in anyway

Meh-eh-eh-eh-eh Certainly Ralphy.... rocks... mmm they look like diamonds - a girl's best friend!Hihihihi! I'd also be most interested to hear who's caught your attention so far. Assuming, as Becka said, you have been paying attention. She does look a bit.. Oh yeah! A girls' day at the spa, why I could have my hair set and my hooves painted; it'd be just swell! *ahem* Yeah, you girls should go to the spa while we men do manly things. Like polish glasses, and build stuff. Yeah. Yeah, I noticed that too. I even commented about it at the time. Actually, I was under the impression that most of us were still pretty sure Carly was a scummo, and so the attempt by her fellow scummos to cloud the issue with the janitor is perhaps wasted. Plus most people seem to be looking closely at Ralphy still, and are dissatisfied with his lacklustre responses so far. So... we're not quite at a loss, and we seem to be coping ok without the information about Carly's allegiance. Plus we get to see interesting interactions, like the sweet relationship with Ernie as he tries to defend Ralphy.

Correct! -ish. We're in BST right now, so midnight GMT is actually just under 25 hours from your post.

A new day, a new draw. It seems constant vigilance pays off... Congratulations Legonardo! You've shortened your name, no? Anyway, you should know the drill by now, send me a PM with your details etc, etc You are both most welcome! Glad to know that things are getting to their destinations. Only one more draw to go but then we enter the excitement of the voting period for the building contests! So have a look around the forums and see all the marvellous entries (I'll be posting thmbnails and links) and I'll also be announcing the prizes for the contest, too!

Nyx smirks slightly as Patricia adopts her usual tone, and sniggers a little when she hears her response to Boomingham. "Captain Patricia, delightful to see you again, you have gained a promotion I see, and you remain as... pleasant as ever." Nyx turns to the Ship's Captain and flashes a winning smile. "And who's this dashing gentleman? Capitano Lorenzo Diablo the Fourth? Hmm, that's a name that rolls off the tongue nicely. Pleasure to meet you Capitano, will you be able to do everything in your power to get us safely home from Strivvi too?" Whilst still smiling, Nyx turns to the Antiquarian. "Good day to you too, sir. It seems you've made great strides in your research, and I am pleased you have a contact in Strivvi. May I ask his name and what he looks like, you know, to prevent painful misunderstandings later? Oh, and Captain Patricia, will it matter what state we find the guards in, as long as we find them? I seem to remember something similar being an issue before." Nyx shrugs, still smiling.

Absolutely; this was what caught my eyes the most: Good news for Friends fans.

I keep forgetting to post mine, so now's as good a time as any. - Ready for the Summer! [I was waxed, buffed, bronzed and bikini ready - how could Rick know?!? Unless he was talking about Summer of Friends, of course...] - Killer puppies from the planet Zurg [As a result of a mini-Town pow-wow at Brickworld where Hinck, Ricey and I brainstormed the Summer of Friends building contest. I made a comment about how I'd love to see mash-ups, such as Friends/ Sci-Fi and gave this as an example. From the oh-so-adorable Hinckley] - RA Anniversary Pandy and Paradisa Reviewer! ['Twas the RA Anniversary, and as a teacher I provided two new reviews for the flooding-of-the-forums-with-RA-reviews, one of which was my third Paradisa review. From lovely Whitefang, who, like my other friends, calls me Pandy.]

Poor Baxter, what a way to go. He didn't strike me as particularly villagey or culty, so he seems an odd kill for anyone other than a serial killer. I'm not ruling out the possibility that it might be a vigilante, and maybe the vig had interactions with Baxter that led them to think he might be - who knows? Only the killer themself, obviously, but speculation is useful. If we're therefore assuming that the axe killer on night one was a scum-kill, then that leads me back to wondering why kill Bristol? I find it hard to believe that the scum have chosen deliberately to not kill two nights in a row, and if Carly was the scum killer it is quite possible her action was passed on before the end of the day (on her death) so that action would still have been available to them. The fact that Carly, being the vocal cow that she was, didn't say anything towards the end of yesterday tends to make me still think she was scum, no matter the action of the janitor. Such a vocal bovine would have voiced her suspicions in an attempt to aid the town if she were townie, but she didn't. Yes, I think so. The possibility of limited shots for certain actions shouldn't be ignored. I'm still not convinced that Bristol's death was the result of a scum kill, there's still a conspicuous absence of rituals or fire, and no sighting of the infernal fox last night either, which leads me to wonder exactly what the scum want us to wonder - what the hell have they been up to? Information from blocks and protections should definitely be explored, and as Becka said, revisiting Ralphy's odd behaviour yesterday might be a useful line of inquiry in the meantime.

"You can't blame a girl for trying. Shame, really, but there you go. It seems like a good idea to borrow 100 gold please. "

I nearly forgot to draw today, with all the excitement of the Friends Designers Interview, but it's still today where I am (or something ), so today's lucky Name-Out-Of-The-Hat is.... Redhead1982! Congratulations!! PM me your details, and a Friends polybag (and more?) will be on its way to you! I'm still waiting on details from Dazmundo and Mr Meleca...

Recently the Eurobricks team were lucky enough to have some questions about the Friends line answered by the Friends Designers themselves. Hot off the press, here are the questions we asked, and the answers they gave us: Eurobricks would like to say a BIG thank you to both Fenella and Rosario for kindly answering our questions, and also a big thank you to Jan Beyer for putting us in contact with them for the interview.

"Take that you big bully!" Nyx shouts at the metasimian as she sends him flying while Atramor guts the last remaining enemy. On receiving the loot from Boomingham Nyx smiles appreciatively. "Thank you Larry, you're very sweet." The appearance of Gurnam was no surprise; having spent many of her formative years around the docks, characters such as he were quite commonplace to her. "Gurnam, lovely to meet you, and sorry about the mess in your warehouse - sometimes we just get a bit... overenthusiastic. Say, 25% is quite steep for an interest rate. You couldn't do a girl a favour and drop it down a smidge could ya? I'd be willing to borrow 100 gold from you if you could drop the rate a few percent. Just this once? "

I got my accordion back! Oh what a happy goat I am! Meh-eh-eh-eh-eh

It seems there's no further room for debate on this issue, so now may I ask that the book isn't split please? If it becomes an accessory, I won't equip it, not with my current accessories. I will never see Edgar again. If it stays as it is, then I still have a 1/36 chance of summoning Edgar each round as I still have the physical element of my Shield. So it won't work for the magic hits, but will still work for the physical hits. It means the chances of summon have reduced yet further from 1/9 all the way down to 1/36 (and if that could be ameliorated, that would be nice, considering it's a massive difference) but the chance still remains. Same with the Explosive Staff - it only works when I have a physical hit rather than a magical hit. Would that at least be ok?

Well, I may have lost my accordion to Portia (and have no-one to play with my sausage ) but at least I have beer! Gilda, I forgot you could beat out a mean tune on the banjolele. More Butthead, anyone? Meh-eh-eh-eh-eh.

Me either. The Book was discussed extensively at the time it was created and given out, and nerfed at that time already. Plus you're also nerfing my back-up weapon (Explosive Staff), plus my Shield is semi-nerfed already.