Hrw-Amen

Yes looks really good. I would also like to see more of the layout. What are all those people doing in the water, is it some local event that you are showing? Here we have a Christmas Day harbour swim, loads of people jump in a race from one side to the other. They must be crazy as the water is freezing at the end of December!

So how many do most of you get? It seems that some people go in and twenty or so from what I see, then they always run out early. On a personal note I get one to keep in the bag, one to make up and one for my nephew. If it is something with lots of good parts I may buy a couple of extra for the bits. I usually send the wife in to do that though as I don't want to appear greedy.

Looks pretty good, the colours are really suited to cows being inside. A pity they don't do white and brown cows. (Or do they? I've only seen the white and black variety from LEGO.) I'll nip across and vote for it now. I have been trying to think of a new type of wagon to build. Thanks for the idea. Of course I'd have to have a cow or two to go in it.

Well, on a personal level I would not buy the knock offs. I have heard good things about the Enlighten train sets, but they are such obvious copies as to make it a pirate act to own one. I understand what you are saying about the price in developing markets and I have some experience of that. Although I live in the UK my wife's family are from Indonesia. When we have visited Jakarta to see our relatives and i have gone shopping with my nephew to buy him some real LEGO, I have found it to be about three times the price I pay for it at home. This in a country where most people earn and survive on about a quarter of my wages. (At least based on my brotherinlaw's salary.) So I do wonder who can actually afford to buy real LEGO in these countries? Certainly not those people bringing up children. Even the knock off brands were about the same price I would pay for a real LEGO set at home. As a result i guess the sales in those countries must be pretty poor. But the joy LEGO can bring is so much. My nephew was really pleased even with the tiny set we bought for him as he could see it was a quality product. But unfortunately he is not likely to ever get another one.

Very good to see that running. All that gearing is something that I struggle with a bit on my engines. I tend to go for ones that are a little simpler than yours as i can never fathom it out. Nice to see the video of it running as well!

I would actually be quite pleased if all those people who wanted to buy me a present for my birthday or Christmas etc bought me a LEGO City set, (Even if it was a fire engine.) as although I like LEGO Trains, I like I imagine most other people want some sort of diorama for the trains to run around in. Therefore a prolific amount of vehicles, modular buildings etc is always welcome. Even if it is a set i have already the parts are good for the bricks in them can always be used for something else. In my experience people such as elderly relatives will not even think of buying LEGO as a gift, they would much rather give me a shirt that is two sizes to small, or some crappy soap that i am never going to use.Even though they know full well what i like they will not buy it!! It is very infuriating indeed, I have often said I want money as I am saving to buy X or Y. Then when the time comes I get a woolly jumper! Hideous!! But in all seriousness, I don't think things are that bad, we have access to bits ourselves which we can buy on-line easily. Not only that, I don't know about anyone else, but if LEGO brought out say a dozen train sets or creator trains even, every year would we have enough funds to buy them all? I am pretty sure I would not, certainly not at the rate of £60-£70 a train and another £30-£40 to get it running!!

Looks good, an engine shed is certainly something I would like, not sure I'd have room to store one, but I would like one all the same.

Yes I am thinking in the range of ten polybags for Saturday's Uruk Hai. Not so sure about the Frodo one as you only need a certain number of Frodos but I guess the heads and that will be useful for other converstions. I've used some of this weekends heads and hands to convert some old castle figures and a couple of spare dwarves and similar from the CMF to fleshies so they can be combined with the other Lotr and Hobbit stuff. It is the only ones I have fleshies in, the rest are yellows. I am not into the Marvel or DC comic ranges so it did not matter to me to do that. Does anyone know if they plan to make any battle packs like they have with star wars and a few others, only looking at my Moria set today it looks a little bland with only two goblins/orcs when in the films it was literally crawling with them, same goes for Helms Deep for that matter and no doubt other sets still to be released.

Perhaps if we want a train lead theme we should make some suggestions for themes to do with trains in the topic asking for ideas in the General Discussions page? If they get bombarded with ones based around trains they may just make one. Admittedly it would have to fit all the other criteria as well.

This is really good. I think my favourite thing is the typewriter.

Nice fort and a lot of Romans.

I have to admit that I had no idea of what a Technodrome was. I imagined it to be a fancy name for one of those glitter ball things you used to get at discos. Anyway after googling it I see it is somehow connected to turtles, though what use a turtle would have for a large glitter ball looking thing I don't know. (I found an image and indeed it does look like one of those.) So I cannot answer your question about this and the wheel size. However I do agree with what the others have said about starting small. I had a ton of LEGO when i was a kid but no matter how much i had I always needed one more of one colour or another to finish something. It was so frustrating as there was no internet back then and mail order took ages. Now I have built up a collection to rival that of my youth with thousands of parts, but even still I come across this. There are some things that I just do not want to take apart and so Bricklink does become your friend and it seems your bank!!. I guess I probably spend more than i should really, but then i don't get out much nowadays. Most Bricklink sellers though have smallish minimum buys and although it may cost a bit more in postage you can for as little as £10.00 get quite a lot of bricks if you look around and don't mind second hand ones. So yes, i would say that is the way to go. I always set out with an idea of what I want to get, but end up thinking just ten og those or ten of these and before you know it you have a massive amount of bricks to use of all sorts and all colours.

Does anyone know what they have on the second Saturday as they appear to have the Sunday one up twice? When this was rumoured to be taking place earlier in the month they were saying an Uruk Hai figure was in the mix. Anyone know if this is the second Saturday figure or is it something else?

That is rather good and brings a smile to the face.

I think that may be the trouble though. If everyone hangs back and puts off buying it to see if it continues then it probably won't as he will not sell much and it would be considered a failure. I like the look of those 48 long straights. I think if i am to invest in some to start off with it would be them as they would be the easiest to mount on base plates by the looks of it. I do like the look of the wider curves, but I want to get a feel for it before buying a lot. Also the price of import taxes have to be taken into account, at least in the UK. They can easily double the price of something by the time the post office adds it handling charge on top. I have been had like that too many times. I should know better by now.

Yes but not in the south west. We don't appear to have any. I think the nearest to me is Cardiff and that is in a different country! I would love them to open one down this way, but I guess the population is just too low over here to support it.

So that big figure is the goblin king, I thought it was supposed to be one of the trolls like in the Moria set! Isn't it a bit big for a goblin even if he is the king?

I am not sure I understand what is going on here? I think I am right in saying TLG are asking for input from the AFOL community as most of us are experienced users of the product. How many threads are there on the forums saying 'I wish TLG made X, Y or Z?' Loads of them. All I read from this is that they want us to suggest some of those ideas to them and maybe if they are any good they may get taken up. Correct me if I am wrong but I don't think they are asking us to actually go and work for them? they just want a bit of feedback from their older audience. It is just a fun hobby and here is an opportunity to have some input to the creators of our hobby. Seams like a good idea as long as we can come up with some good ideas. I will have to get thinking of some. If I can I'll post them on. Seams quite an exciting thought actually and rather a fun thing to do!

I know I had quite a few of those flags as a kid, they would have been bought by my parents in 1969/70. Not sure which countries they are though. If I ever get the box out of the attic at their house I'll check them. Some look familiar but I am not sure which.

Yes that is exactly what I mean, just like the wheel set for vehicles. On a personal note I don't think it would even have to include a baseplate as I've never used one except on standard sets. They could add some extra wheels and buffers. Just a box of wheels, buffers and magnets would be good enough. Of course you could just get them off of the web site via PAB, but it would be good to see something like this and it would be cheap enough for an impulse buy. We also sold out of the crossing set in my area. They sold quite quickly, got restocked once or twice. I then asked for one and they did not have any. The shop said they ordered them but they did not come and then they vanished from the web site as well. So at least where I am they actually did sell quite well.

I see he has put up an animation on how the bits fit together. It does make the system a lot clearer seeing how it comes together and I think it actually looks quite good. Just need to see the bit in store for connecting it to existing LEGO track now and I may be sold on the idea.

Is that a magic show, I thought it looked more like ballet and gambling in those two sets? Maybe a girly casino?

Wonderful station build and a nice train to go with it. Does the train need some overhead wires though to finish it off?

It is not that humans have to be the bad guys as opposed to the insects. I am pretty sure as a young child I was able to grasp that all sides have several shades of good and bad. they could just make two factions, both could have human and alien as members. They could both then be seen as the good or bad guys depending on which one you as the collector wanted to be which without the racial stereotypes. Surely that is a good positive thing for children to learn/know as opposed to all aliens are bad and we are always right and good for o other reason than we are human? It was something my parents taught me from a very early age. (Even if they did not themselves always adhere to it.)

It is not strictly true that Lotr has not had any merchandise over the years. Some games/wargames companies have been producing them for donkey's years now. I remember buying small sets of goblins and elves and that sort of thing relating to Lotr when I was at school which was some thirty odd years ago. It was readily available in toy/model shops and since the advent of the internet has become much more so. As for swoshability, I can imagine that a Mirkwood or Rivendell would swosh quite well, can't you just picture it!! I do think that if Friends is popular which it certainly seems to be then it will probably be around longer, in ten or even twenty years time. I am not sure about Lotr, it has the potential to be but probably only if they can get a licence for the whole universe and not just the five films. Now, let me just swosh my Ork forge!!