Brickander Brickumnus

Ok, now I get it why you built it the way you did (the version with 6 bottom row gun ports per side). The 8 gun ports version, looks much better. I think the small prefab boat in the middle contributes a lot to this perception of "fattiness". In the schematics it seems to be at the same height as the top cannons row. I don't know if this would be possible though, with the current width of the ship. I always had the impression, and still do, that because of the size of the LEGO shooting cannons, an 18 stud width prefab hull piece will make much more sense. Both in being more visually realistic and giving greater playability. Yes. Same quality as the one of the stern photo here, for proper scaling comparison purposes:

@cehnot Thanks for the file! About the small-medium size galleon, the ship looks fatty. In my eyes, it needs to become longer. I think as a general rule, there is a direct correlation between ship length and height. This custom hull is great! And I like how you made it a little bit wider. Can you post a good quality picture of the front, from about a 45o angle? Posting some pictures of these designs you are referring, will make it easier to understand your problem. What's a "bracer"?

Nevertheless, it's a very good build! I wonder how many more good pirate builds from the past, are here in EUROBRICKS, that people would love to see them.

I'm interested. I'm also interested in seeing some renders of the version you are working now.

Here is the instructions manual for the Skull's Eye Schooner (6286). https://manuall.co.uk/lego-set-6286-pirates-skulls-eye-schooner/

Nice! Can you post your photos somewhere we can enjoy them in greater quality?

I tried for some time before posting, but since I couldn't remember the search terms I used then, I didn't find the results I wanted. That's why I usually save the links of things I find interesting. But in this particular instance I didn't find them interesting then. I remember thinking how stupid it is to buy Chinese knock off of 21322 for $120 (plus more in some instances, due to customs), when you could buy LEGO 21322 for $200.

Discussions I stumbled upon in Reddit, Facebook and some sites in French, German and southeast Asia languages by using google translate. Unfortunately, I didn't keep the links at the time, cause it was at the beginning when I started to search for LEGO Pirates again.

Has anyone build a MOC by combining the remaining pieces of 21322 with the pieces of 31109, using as many pieces as possible, preferably all?

Sales data is very difficult to track and calculate because there are too many sellers in AliExpress. A lot of them close the particular sales page of a product when this product becomes "out of stock". Also a lot of the sellers close their stores and new ones open all the time. Finally, there are also many sellers in southeast Asia that sell Chinese pirates sets and they operate outside the AliExpress platform. Ok, I stopped making a list at 60 sets, cause it will take me a lot of time if I try to find and include all the sets. And there are many many more! A lot of these (probably more than 50%) are of Chinese design, with many being inspired or borrowing aspects of original LEGO sets. The majority of them are from the Pirates side. Imperials are clearly at a disadvantage. There are copies of LEGO sets 6285, 6280, 4184, 4195, 10210, 71042, 21322, 31109, for example. What is interesting is that they copied 6285 and 6280, but they didn't copy 6274, 6271, 6286, 6243, 70413. Also they didn't copy any of the big Pirates and Imperial bases of 1989-1997. They sell Imperial Soldiers and Pirates of the Caribbean mini-figures individually or in packs, but strangely no Pirates mini-figures. Every time LEGO releases a big good set, like 21322 or 31109, in various conversations in forums, a lot of people were anticipating and are anticipating the release of the equivalent Chinese copy, in order to buy it! Lately they have started aggressively coping design of MOCers. From all of the above, there is clearly a big demand for LEGO-like Pirate sets, otherwise they wouldn't have gotten in all this trouble! For comparison, a search in AliExpress for "Castle" or "Knights" sets gives very few results, the majority of them simplistic and of poor visual quality. There are a lot of castle/knights mini-figures though! Like really A LOT!

Number of sales I don't know. But tomorrow I can give you number of ship sets, if you are interested.

Judging by the number of LEGO style pirate ships being sold in AliExpress (copies of official LEGO sets, copies of MOC sets, sets of Chinese design) and lately the number of bases (Pirates and Imperials), there certainly is a quite substantial one.

Adding some photos in your posts, like @evancelt, will be helpful. Especially for us who we don't have "specialty" in minifigures.

They didn't copy the Ideas design. They copied the 4th rate Ship of the Line, scaling it down to the prefabricated hull dimensions. The 4th rate Ship of the Line is a much bigger ship, which wasn't submitted to the Ideas and can't be submitted, due to the very high piece count.

Maybe there was a change of LEGO plans. Guess, we might have to reverse engineer the Caribbean Clipper remake, like we did with the Pirate Bay... for those of us that like this ship and want to build it.

You are right. This monstrosity is a whole category of it's own!

I count this as DUPLO...or DUPLO-Hybrid, so I didn't put it in the list. But nevertheless it's absolutely horrible. What were they thinking...

Oh please no! Not something like the Renegade Runner! It's the second worst Pirate ship LEGO has ever released. Only Cross Bone Clipper beats it.

They are publicly accessible. No idea why links keep getting broken. I uploaded them to Imgur and edited my post.

Although the title is outrageously clickbait, this whole design+title is a completely out of the box thinking! Big Kudos! P.S: Add some Pirate bandanas, if you have spare.

Just a minor correction for clarification. This isn't the design of the Caribbean Clipper remake, but the design of a much larger 4th rate Ship of the Line. The Chinese modified it a little, scaling it down to the size of prefabricated hull pieces. Of course it's obviously way inferior to the original fan design, but as you said some parents will definitely buy it for their kids. Here is a comparison of the 4th rate Ship of the Line with the Caribbean Clipper remake. As you can see, there is clearly a difference in size. And here is a comparison with the Imperial Flagship (10210). There is a big possibility that in a few months we might see the Caribbean Clipper remake being sold by a Chinese company, albeit with prefabricated hulls. If this happens... honestly, as one that has many Chinese pirate ships (bought them before LEGO announcing the release of Pirates of the Barracuda Bay), I'll be very tempted to buy it. By the way, they have done the same thing with Pirates of the Barracuda Bay and the original Pirates Bay IDEAS submission. releasing both sets individually as copies! And they took it a step further, by releasing Pirates of the Barracuda Bay as a ship with black sails, together with the rests of the parts as a rudimentary base-structure plus a huge brick built baseplate. It's a complete diorama. And this thing happens with other themes and MOC designs. For example, the recently approved IDEAS set, The Starry Night. https://www.brickfanatics.com/aliexpress-is-already-selling-a-knock-off-version-of-lego-ideas-the-starry-night/ As I've said before, LEGO should really up it's game. Cause if they don't, they'll might be in big trouble further down the line.

I'm checking the list with all the sets LEGO has released, in the original Pirates Theme and in the Pirates of the Caribbean subtheme. Pirates Line Sets Pirates of the Caribbean Line Sets Looking things from the perspective of an adult (beauty, display, economics, parts, building process) and the perspective of a child (beauty, playability, building process, storytelling/story-creating), these are MY observations: In the Pirates of the Caribbean the only good sets for me are the Black Pearl and the Queen Anne's Revenge, both are ships. Some people (maybe a lot?) regard the Silent Mary as a good set too (personally I dislike it, it my eyes it looks like an abomination). The rest it seems to me are mediocre to shitty, with dark colors that make them gloomy and unattractive. I would never have bought these sets, nor for me, nor for my kids. In the original Pirates Theme, lots of good sets early on, with things starting to go down the drain from 1994 and onwards (with some noticeably good exceptions, most of them being ships). Releasing not good sets, expecting to have profit out of them and then blaming the whole theme as "having lost it's appeal with the consumers" is absurd. Some other things that I regard as bad practice: 1) Not releasing in the same time one good set for Pirates and one good set for Imperials, like LEGO did when it first started the Pirates theme (e.g. the Black Seas Barracuda and the Caribbean Clipper). Pirates is an agonist-antagonist theme. Pirates battling Imperials and vice versa. Nowadays it's a lot about the story and the narrative. Releasing only Pirates set/sets for example, removes a lot from this. 2) Not releasing sets that contain only Pirates crew/Imperials soldiers. For example, I want to add some more crew to my Pirates of the Barracuda Bay. I want to buy them new, not used from Bricklink (I'm of these guys that in a lot of things prefers new stuff instead of used and certainly dislike mixing new with used.) 3) Not releasing a set that contains only cannons. Again, I want to add some more cannons to my Pirates of the Barracuda Bay. I want to buy them new, not used from Bricklink. Another thing to take into consideration: I'm may be wrong, but I have the impression that most of the MOC ships (and bases) that fans are making are from the Imperial side. So it seems the gap LEGO is leaving in the Imperials side is" somewhat filled" by fans. I believe a lot of the above things I address, is the LEGO mentality of seeing some things disjointed and in fragmentation. A mentality that was clearly displayed with what it did with the splitting of votes in the Castle and Space Themes in the Fan Vote of the 90th Anniversary of The LEGO Group. This is probably true. Especially if they are planning to release some sets when the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie comes out.

Three more Pirates Theme entries: Imperial Foundation Box Marketplace on the Sea (3 in 1) Imperial Guards Trading Outpost

i was also very disappointed, but maybe this has to do with COVID, the whole financial crisis and the reduction in purchasing power of people this thing has brought.

You're talking about this? Realizing more LEGO Ideas designs together with the BrickLink Designer Program