ARC2149Nova

And there's enough background aliens/interesting designs to make the cast. Plus a Bith or five

... You win.

That's a bit too much of a stretch. "Good relations with the Wookies, I have" is far less worthy of screentime than "You fought in the Clone Wars?" I meant more along the lines of the Death Star's "weakness", which was never that much of a plothole to begin with, becoming the focus of a whole movie. Or the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs (a unit of distance) which was clearly just a lie on Han's part (it's even in the script), but that didn't stop everyone from trying to make it work literally. Backstories are cool, but sometimes it can get ridiculous (no matter how good Rogue One was )

I think it's just the Cantina. The Shuttle rumor might have been false from the start.

Touche!

My comment wasn't really against you, but rather just the idea of taking new blood to do established character's work. And I also don't think every throwaway line needs a backstory (that's just me though). Of course, there are a lot of TCW storylines that we'll never see fully, but maybe someday we'll get to some of them.

You see, this is why the Bad Batch irks me. No, they shouldn't be on Kashyyyk. Yes, give them interesting missions prior to Order 66, but please, keep them from trodding ground that belongs to others. Only special forces on Kashyyyk were Delta Squad. And no matter how many shows/cameos Bad Batch gets, Delta will always be the better team. (of course that's just opinion) We'll finally have our wretched hive of scum and villainy in a set that does it justice! Just hope they don't skimp on the alien denizens. Or it could've been false from the get, sadly.

I do, but I fear to open that can of worms. Might just lose an arm.

Yawn. Bad Batch is okay, but wake me up when Delta Squad gets a show. Don't get me wrong, I love new characters, but Filoni tends to market his creations over pre-existing ones.

To be fair, that blue Mando is not supposed to be Paz Vizla. Also gonna echo sentiments of Angry Clone's departure. Jang might just have a heart attack. I'm not huge on the individual faces (it creates too many "variants" of essentially the same fig on brickset/bricklink), but it is a nice touch. I've personally thought the Naboo Pilot's face should've replaced the Angry Clone ages ago (at least Imperial wise), so here's to more of such useful heads. We might even get female stormtroopers/biker scouts (it's just a head swap after all).

I'm appointing you: Bombad General! This is really good. The curvature is all there, and I especially love the arch for the turret section. Also those engines are just perfection.

Is the idea of internal struggle/corporate sabotage foreign to you? It must be to have such a dismissive attitude. Now, whether or not Disney is the cause, it can't be denied that "poor" business decisions (either intended or by accident) lead to financial failure, and at worst, financial suicide. When George was at the helm, the merch was strong with this one, but even since the Disney deal went down, t-shirts, caps, and plushies went up, but action figures (the core 3.75 in. scale) and Lego sets dropped, if not in rate, then in originality and "freshness". Sure, some good has come from Disney's regime (Rogue One, though unnecessary, The Mandalorian, and even games like Jedi Fallen Order) but it's undeniable that Star Wars merch is all but dead. TROS merch is dead, TLJ and TFA merch is dead, Rogue One and Solo merch got gutted, and Rebels and Resistance merch either died off, or never made it past training. In George's day, a game like Fallen Order would be hyped to hell's end, and if the final product was the same as we know, it would've been a guaranteed success. I mean look at the Force Unleashed games. If you love the house of mouse, that's fine. But, Disney will only risk guaranteed rewards, which is to say, they play it safe and take no risks. This. Something for all of us to remember too is this: even if something's not a huge return profit-wise, even a portion of the fanbase's money is better than no money at all. There are plenty of risky sets that would no doubt be loved by the community, but if you ignore those sets, a potential market goes untapped. Besides, none of us even knew what the IT-S was before Lego dropped it (okay, most of us didn't know what it was), but a lot of people like it. No doubt the Stinger Mantis (at the absolute least) has more recognition.

Very true. I left out the Rogue Shadow since it has been several years since that set released, and things are forever changing within Lego, but it's another point that contradicts them. Looking at the interview again, I can see that, but would it really kill them to give us a Stinger Mantis? Or, at least go the Battlefront route and give us a character pack? The Mandalorian is a huge success, so they make sets for that, perfectly reasonable, but TCW and Fallen Order (both of which were well received, at least within Star Wars and Video Game fandom) one gets a couple minifigs, the other gets nothing. While all those sets are/were great, it's almost like Lego has lost all business sense lately.

Their excuses for not doing Fallen Order sets is a load of bantha poodoo. "Who knows where these characters may show up later..." meanwhile we get minfigures of The Joker. Nothing against that, but come on. The logic is weak. Plus, as one commentor mentioned, we get T-rated sets all the time (Overwatch, 3 Battlefront packs, freaking Stranger Things, which I never would've dreamed would be a Lego theme). James Bond's Aston Martin, Simpsons, I could go on. If there's no issue with those, then anything Star Wars is a safe bet. But sure, "it might be inappropriate." Like we haven't got figures of a literal mass murderer multiple times now (). Sorry for the rant, but it's such crap. As to more Mandalorian sets, I think those were a given, seeing as how the show has exploded in popularity. After all, we still need the Beskar suit, Kuill, and even Moff Gideon. Sets will need to be a bit more creative, but there's some cool things they can do.

I feel like a lot of us were sleeping on that theme. I only got one set, but the theme at large was perfect for fantasy mocs, at least parts wise. There are a few standout location sets, plenty of colorful foliage, and the hair, hood, and cape pieces could be useful as well. I imagine now, more people are retroactively interested, so they're becoming rarer to acquire.

Actually yes. I don't know about the Force Awakens, but DC Supervillains at the very least kept Luthor to the deluxe edition.

They also gave it the wrong legs. which is a much bigger error in my opinion.

There's almost no good mask alternative without it looking ridiculously off. Of the parts I own, from the couple hundred heads I got floating around, only one remotely comes close (imho): Reaper from Overwatch. Maybe, Soldier 76 might work (which I don't have), or Reinhardt for Light Revan, but those are the only options I can think of. For a bit of a different take, I've found this head at least.

Well of course they are!

It's the most famous "Faction" in Star Wars, mainly due to the Clone Wars TV series and of course the costuming organization. There's also the fact that they're canonically (and Legendarily) Vader's Fist, the best stormtroopers in the Empire, and with how many of us love stormtroopers, I think the 501st can rightly be called the coolest Star Wars army. It works whether you love the prequels or originals more. To reiterate, Stormtroopers under Vader are 501st too (always have been), and the most iconic Star Wars soldier is? I mean, it doesn't get much more iconic than the 501st. You're right. So I guess it wouldn't be too much to ask for a repeat of that.

Despite everything, all told I love the 501st set. Don't know how it'll affect things going forward, but as with Duel on Starkiller Base, sets that are a new spin on an old concept can bring good things. I firmly believe there's room for both types of battle pack, and I think Lego knows that. This might even be better than a normal battle pack (post-2014): we get real blasters! Not to start anything, but I will say this: the initial advertising for the first 8 battle packs (2007-2010) had "Build Your Army" literally on the box. And over time, nothing's really changed, but like with Hasbro's Battle Packs, some are more figure packs and some are pure army builders. The term is just interchangeable. It would be wonderful to get a set reveal, I personally hope it's a set for next year, but I don't recall if they've done that in recent years.

Firstly, Inferno Squad doesn't count as it's not an Army Builder (we have Iden, Del, and Gideon), so if we insist on counting droids (which already outly due to figure count) 9/38 still isn't the majority. Furthermore, you all keep insisting the overall faction would've been represented, which I never contested. And I certainly don't believe we'd have gotten a versus pack. All I said was, that four identical 501st Privates, not 3 privates and a Jet, not 2 privates and 2 Jets, 4 Privates, the run-of-the-mill troopers, weren't going to be presented at the $15 mark. That's all I was saying. The only packs with 4 identical troopers are all told around 3 (ITT, Rebel Scout, and Death Watch). If you insist that 4 501st figures means "four blue clones", fine, but that was never anyone's contention. Hopefully that clears everything up. I wasn't attempting to debate or argue anyone. I simply made a reply to someone's question. And if $30 battle packs will become the norm, then what's to become of the $15 to ones?

I think this is the bigger point, one that I'm surprised campaigners haven't realized. This isn't a traditional battle pack, in fact it's a rather poor army builder once you consider the price. Even further, the changing of the figure design may be this to a fault as well (considering almost everyone expected new 501st troops to share the 2014 style). They easily could've mocked-up another battle pack if the need arose, but they didn't. They gave us what we wanted, but at a cost. The set's still nice, but Lego clearly knows how to retain control of their product line.

According to Brickset, we've had 38 battle packs over the last 13 years. 7 of which have included all identical or nearly all-identical figures (more like 10 if you count the droids and Inferno Squad). 7/38 is not the majority. It's quite the minority. The point I made was that most battle packs only include 2 "standard" troopers. Most people don't want a bunch of extra classes, like Airbornes, ARFs, Jet Troopers, what have you. Those figures aren't a problem, but we're talking about a $15 Battle Pack with 4 (identical) 501st clones. It wasn't happening. Thankfully, we got 3 normal 501st troopers and a Jet trooper, but at a cost of an additional $15. This isn't arguing, it's literally a statement of fact. But you admit that the figures are split 50/50, which is the point I made. There was no chance of getting 4 standard 501st troopers without paying at least $30, if not more (see the infamous First Order Battle Pack). That doesn't mean Utapau Troopers was "not a 212th Battle Pack", that wasn't anyone's contention. However, it does show that even packs with one unit represented divides the lineup into the standard and special classes. And no one needs an even split between the 212th standard and Airbornes. That doesn't make any of the 50/50 split packs terrible by any means. Or even battle packs with entirely individual troops, but it is clearly a pattern. Tl;dr: 7/38 Battle Packs had 3-4 of the same, wholly identical figure (with the ITT technically being two types with the heads, but that's not worth splitting hairs over). 19 of the remaining 31 had 2 identical figures, about 6 of which were split 50/50. All three of you sadly missed the point I was making. Here's the post I replied to: And I've clearly established a ratio which makes my point clear. I'm not saying other battle packs don't qualify as faction specific, or anything else wild like that. My actual point, is that the idea of 4 all identical 501st clones for a $15 battle pack, at this point, was highly, highly unrealistic. That is all.

Sith Troopers Battle Pack. Nuff said. Okay, to be less facetious, the only battle packs that straight up had 3-4 of the same figures are (not counting droids: Imperial Dropship (both versions), Rebel Scout Speeder, Clone Walker (The Commander's gear is removable), Mandalorians (Death Watch), Imperial Troop Transport, and that's pretty much it. The rest are either split 50/50 troop as to the troop type, or only have 2 repeats with 2 unique troopers. So we were never getting 3-4 501st privates with maybe a Jet or ARF Trooper for $15.