SilvaShado

I really really hope that they move away from Belville next year. It sucks completely. It has some of the concepts that I want, the more fairy-tale bent, but the execution of it is just all wrong. It needs to be normal minifigure size and range into more colors than purple and pink. If they don't get it right next year, I'll be... Then I'll go make my own fairy-tale sets the way I want them to be.

I just thought that it'd be cool if they build up to a winter themed train and train station. That'd be really cool!

My LUG has meetings at local libraries so we post flyers up there. You could post fliers asking for people to contact you to start up a LUG. You could start up a facebook group to easily collect people and communicate. You might also ask the manager at the LEGO store if you could post a flyer there. Good luck starting one up!

Welcome! Glad I could help. Thanks for explaining the italics. It's your choice to write it as you like it.

I'm a little confused as to why the creative critic is still going on. What's the point of providing responses to the entries if the creators of those entries can't take any of the advice and make changes?

You're welcome! I'm glad I could help.

Unfortunately, none of the Targets in my area got them and I've been keeping an eye out for months. They've only had a city helicopter, a toy story army man and an atlantis diver. For Easter, they had the city fire chief, star wars at-at walker and the Ninjago dragon, but those all sold out quickly. I'll now have 2 because I got one from ordering online at LEGO store and I bought one from bricklink. I may just have to buy more from bricklink.

Love the picture - it sets up the story very well. And the story is very excellently written. It kept me hooked all the way through. The emotions and personality of the two characters came across very clearly. I only have one minor punctuation suggest: There should be a comma after Sparrow and the word he should be lower cased. Like this: Commodore Norrington swallowed hard. “Jack Sparrow,” he sputtered. The words poured from his mouth like poison. Otherwise, fantastic job! Good luck in the contest!

I agree with Bricks4Fun in that I like how you seamlessly wove the classic pirates world with Pirates of the Caribbean. This is a very nice narrative that sums up Jack's past travels. And while it's good and written well, the only thing I'd point out is that you have no action. This feels like the beginning of a movie where text is rolling across the screen, recapping what's already happened so the audience will be well-informed about the events that will soon happen. I don't necessarily think you should change it. I just want to point this out so you're aware that it might turn off some readers. And who knows, I may be alone in this opinion. Good luck in the contest!

You have a good idea here, but I think some of it is hard to follow because you don't have much description. The dialogue is good, but it's hard to tell what is going on. I suggest cutting the beginning as you've got two different scenes and it takes away words from the really important part. If you just start with Jack being drunk and taken by surprise, and still include the crew being tied up, I think it would be very funny. This should give you some wiggle room to add more description to the dialogue. That's just my opinion. Feel free to take it or not as I'm just trying to help. Good luck in the contest.

Actually, it looked more like a phoenix than a dragon, but it's cool nonetheless. I bought two when I saw them, one for home and one for work. Oh, and thanks for the review. Nicely done.

Very cool review! Thanks for all the detailed pictures. This is the set I was looking for when Ninjago first came out, but I was disappointed in the first run. I want more authentic building designs with the fantastical ninja elements. I may just have to buy two of these so I can keep one as is and use the other to make my own, more stable display set. That sword, if they don't print it elsewhere, is going to become a very expensive piece!

Being a huge castle fan, I wish they had released Target Practice as an impulse set so I could make an archer army. Ah, well. Not a fan of the Alien Conquest, but I'm looking forward to the new Ninjago building sets. I hope the other dragons come out in August too.

Thanks! I certainly think it was worth buying. It'll help anyone who wants to learn new techniques and improve on their building skills.

Welcome! Glad I could help. :-D

A very good first draft. I like how quietly Jack snuck aboard the ship and stole the treasure chest. It looks like there are plenty of places where you can cut out 7 words. Just go over every sentence and see where you can trim a word or two and soon it'll be under 300 words. I'll point out a few places that I think would really help make the flow better. Also, here are some corrections. Please feel free to take them or leave them. I'm just trying to help. :-) I believe the word "an" is supposed to be "and" Here's a place you can cut out a few words and get rid of the repetition. I suggest removing "sweet dreams" and just have the governor dreaming of capturing more pirates. Or, if you like sweet, you can say he was sweetly dreaming of capturing more pirates. It takes out one word and the repetition is gone. I'd suggest getting rid of "But" as its not a good idea to start a paragraph with it, but also because it doesn't really add to what you're saying. You've got a lot of words here that don't need to be here and there's some repetition. You also have some fragments, though I'm not opposed to a well-placed fragment, it's usually frowned upon. Also be careful of using too many pronouns (he, she, etc) in one sentence as readers may get confused as to who you are talking about. Here's what I'd suggest: ...there was a pirate much worse than Brickbeard, who was the most feared pirate at the time. This pirate went by the name of Jack Sparrow. Captain Jack Sparrow was currently unknown to the Governor, even though Jack was in the same room as him and stealing his treasure chest. This is a bit of a run-on sentence with more words than it needs. Here's my suggestion He made his way back out to the deck, which was currently connected to the hull of the Black Pearl. Jack's ship loomed over the comparatively small Imperial Flagship. There needs to be a comma after climbing. You don't need the word now, especially since it changes the tense of your story. I'd also suggest some alternate punctuation. It's not necessarily right, but it may have a bigger impact. He gave a long piercing whistle; a signal to set sail in an unusual direction--downwards. You need some punctuation in this sentence, or you need to split it in two. And you have too many words saying the same thing. Also, the word "this" should be "his." Here's what I suggest: Jack completely knew the effect of that whistle and within a few seconds, he saw the confused face of the Governor at his cabin window. Since this is from the Governor's perspective, I suggest putting this on a new line. It will also punctuate the end of your story. And instead of the comma, I suggest using the double dash. Hope my comments help! Good luck in the contest!

LOL! This made me laugh! It's a good one, for sure! Really great comedic timing and pacing. I have one minor correction to punctuation. There should be a period after Rummey, not a comma.

But one thing to not forget is the educational value. The book is not just a basic building instruction manual. It's chock full of tips and extras from master builders. Plus there's a lot of online stuff to do that is actually very helpful and fun. So that's one thing to factor into the price - how much a person can actually learn from these sets. But that'll be hard to determine a value and will depend on each person. If someone is already a really good builder, they may not get much out of these sets. But if someone is new to LEGO or doesn't have good building skills, these sets will help a lot. Oh, and there are some good downloads to be had online. There will be different version of the brick paper plus extra builds for the kids that are not in the printed book. I also really enjoyed the articles from the master builders about how they design and build.

Thanks so much! That helps a lot! Thanks! I really hope you can. I'm sure people on bricklink will be selling it soon, if not already. That's if you can't get them in regular stores where you live. Thanks so much! It was a lot of fun. :-D

Thanks for the suggestion. Taken and revised! Hope you enjoy.

Yes, I'm glad too. I remember the mirco-building contest, but I wasn't able to enter because of the rule of being a member before the contest started. Then that contest was over and I forgot to sign up on Eurobricks for the next contest. Then Pirates came up and I was very grateful that it didn't have the requirement. I wanted to vote for that contest, but it said I couldn't vote because I hadn't been a member before the contest started. Otherwise I would have voted and then I'd be able to have all the bonus points here. So I'd suggest getting rid of the rule that you have to be a member before a contest starts, but then I realize the purpose of the rule is to prevent people from stuffing the ballot and having their friends sign up to vote for them. So there's no win-win situation there. :-(

Glad to see that you went with version 2. It was my favorite. :-) Good luck in the contest! I think you've got a solid entry.

I recently bought the MBA Kit 1 Space Designer. After you build all of their builds, they encourage you to build your own. Below is my very first free-build, built all on my own--which is quite an achievement for me! Here's the link to the folder on flickr: http://www.flickr.co...57627118204318/ I'm new to using flickr so I haven't figured out how to embed a picture into a forum post yet. Oh, and here's my blog entry about my journey through the Space Designer and creating the Star Defender: http://thebrickblogg...uilder-academy/ I'd love to know what you all think!

lol! Thanks so much for posting a link to my blog! I'm so happy that people are liking it and the MBA. MBA is very good for the educational value. I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to improve their building skills, as indicated in my blog post.

I can only echo what others have said. You've got great terminology and a very funny story. The only problem is that its a bit confusing due to how you've laid out the story. I agree with Blackpyre as you need to separate peoples' actions and dialogue. For example: First off, I'm not sure who he is in the beginning. You say he would not take it off and in the next sentence that he was polishing the armor. Then it was tedious for the admiral. So is the admiral refusing to take off his own armor, trying to polish it himself and finding it tedious? Proper names go a long way to clearing up this type of confusion. Also, whoever says the dialogue should have an action before it, even if its as simple as: The Admiral said, "Are you quite finished? Also, you need to put lines of empty space between the paragraphs to make it easier to read. It's a convention of web writing that is very different when writing for print. I hope my comments help. Good luck in the contest!