RichardGoring

Before it get shuts down then, I'm hoping to build an extension to the Temple of the Golden Idol. User softguy on Reddit did one and it looks terrfic. Modified 77015 Golden Idol Temple : lego (reddit.com) I'm still surprised how little there is on Rebrickable for this though. It would be awesome to get a few more sections.

I lucked out finding a nearly new box in Joanns this evening, and got the three goatherds and three barbarians in it, plus two mushroom sprites, and a train boy. Then went to a Walmart next door and they had a few packs left in a box (all unopened, which was nice), and got another two goatherds and a barbarian. Throughout 2023 none of the stores near me seemed to get CMFs until several weeks after the launch date, so feeling really good about managing to get everything I wanted by January 9, and on the first time of looking. All of them had the small barcodes, but the 3mm wireless scope camera I got recently was excellent. It's just able to get into the holes in the box without damage, and you can see really clearly. It will be even quicker if LEGO can do full barcodes for all packs in future. Or, better yet, just put names on there.

New photos on the Bricklink Designer Program Series 1, I note. The Mountain Fortress looks even better in these new images, to me. The others slightly less good. I do like the train shed, but it's pricey for what it looks like. Although the angle deceives you for just how large it is, spread over two baseplates. I know that's so it fits a train, but part of me wishes it was a much smaller build for half the price, as I like the look, and don't need the function. The snack shack is great, but $50 seems expensive for something that compares to a $20-$30 LEGO set (yes, with more detail in the base, but that doesn't add a huge amount to it for me). Designer Program Series 1 [BrickLink] Decisions, decisions. Not long to make them now. Series 2 feels like a Buy All (ideally), and Series 3 is pretty hotly contested too! So budgeting for those is also important. I like that the sets will be shipped just four months after ordering. That's a big improvement.

I think it's this one - LEGO 10305 Lion Knights' Castle & 10497 Galaxy Explorer: Designer Interview! (youtube.com)

Wow, that's an incredible piece count, and at that price point it's going to be a decent sized set - likely double the size of recent ones, which were themselves pretty large. Blurring with Icons sets here quite a lot.

Eldorado Fortress was a LEGO exclusive, so the details of it are not given to other retailers and LEGO can control the information more easily. Most licensed sets are sold though other retailers, and it's generally through third party retailers that you get the leaks.

Nice idea. The impression of Minas Tirith, with some greatest hits, and the feel of it would likely give the best value to everyone, even though some of the compromises might be hard.

Really lovely work!

Indeed!

Yes. Two different boxes of six with no doubles, giving me a complete set. Not sure if I'm lucky, given that others appear to have had duplicates. But in the past, it's been possible to get repeats, but not likely. They also had the small QR codes on, so you can't scan them to learn what's inside, but that may be due to being an early production run?

That's curious. I got two of the six-packs and had a complete set from them. My selection was very similar to Sir Dano's breakdown in the photos above, but without the duplicate/missing figure. It does seem that it's not guaranteed to get a full A/B, as that has happened for the last few series of six-pack boxes, but duplicates/overlaps appeared to be the exception rather than the norm. Also, all of the boxes in my six packs were small barcodes. Might go out hunting for more goatherds, barbarians, and mushroom sprites tomorrow.

I don't care about the particular goat, just any. In fact, ideally a different one, so I can have a mix of goats up a tree, instead of all being identical!

Agreed. I think the best approach for Minas Tirith would be to do the citadel and white tree, with the platform raised up just a little to give the sense of things below. It could be minifigure scale and include lots of detail. Doing something modular would be great, but I don't think it could happen, as they'd have to make each component standalone, and I suspect that at least some would need to be less than stunning, so why not just make it a single set. If you go down the route of microscale, then the vast majority of it is going to be mountain and you lose the fabulous detail that I imagine most people want from Minas Tirith. However, I think it's the reverse for Barad-Dur, where most people probably want the full tower with the eye atop it. Similar to Orthanc, the full shape is iconic, and the details inside are nice, but non-essential.

Two six-packs of CMF 25 arrived and I now have a complete set, including a goat. At some point we talked about doing a goat tree, and it's very tempting to try and get a load of goats and add them to a bonsai tree to do this. But not at $5 per blind box. So I hope they come to PAB or BAM at some point, because I still think it would be fun for a dozen goats to be climbing up the bonsai tree.

The fact that it's Nanoscale on the outside and minifig scale on the inside doesn't seem to bother people. So merging locations as a means to get desired things into sets is probably fine. The interior could essentially be a series of Mordor vignettes, just like it was for the Jurassic Park gate.

And split up into two mini-releases too, which likely didn't help get the shelf presence that a full wave would. Having said that, they were generally expensive for what they were, and I think had limited play potential compared to similar Friends or City sets. The wider range of price points this time may suggest a broader array of play experiences that could lead to greater interest.

Oh, that's so clever if it's intentional!

Really nicely done!

That's a pain, but at least you found it. I don't really have time to go through the things I've ordered right now, but may have to bump them up in the priority order in case something is missing.

Agreed. I suspect it's the rarity rather than the theme. But that doesn't mean Indiana Jones doesn't have a reasonable appeal for LEGO sets.

$610 sold price on eBay for the Voodoo doll nanofig from the ToD set. Crazy!

Oh yes, I realize, and it's obvious even when you watch the films and think about it for a second or two. But, having not seen them for a while, I could very easily believe that a lot of those things happened really near each other, or even in the same place, so it would be fairly easy for LEGO to add those scenes into Barad-Dur.

I went on the LEGO website every day (sometimes more) during the pandemic to see if I could get Barracuda Bay, fearing that they would discontinue it. It was, for a long time, the first item in my phone's quick links. Fortunately they brought it back, but I was also surprised that it retired so quickly.

I really enjoy Lord of the Rings, and have watched the movies a number of times, but not for a while. So, probably slightly on the more educated side of a casual fan. Currently building Rivendell and we're watching the movies while doing so. I thought that both the Frodo rescue, and the Black Gate were in/near Barad-dur. It's obvious when you think about it, but it's very plausible for scenes from those locations to appear in a Barad-dur set, and would give them a bunch more detail to be able to add into the set. Or they could include the preparation for the battle at Minas Tirith, as a way to include side builds and figures/characters, although it's a much bigger stretch and scaling would be odd.

You are correct! Only one order delivered. The one I wanted most, which is great. But a mystery about the other three. I hope they all arrived into the US in the same shipment and one of them got brought out first. Also, this was the largest order and so is in a box. The others are likely in padded envelopes, so may get processed through a different route and have taken a bit longer.