SuvieD

The best is both. Enough realism to set the time period/cliche and enough fantasy to make it fun. Too much fantasy makes the sets garbage and too much realism takes the fun out of it all.

Great castle. One of the best I have seen. The color scheme is perfect and the size and sheer detail in the MOC is perfect. The Ninja theme needs to have a round two soon. Come on LEGO, please!!! X-D

Weird, I just wrote about something like this in a different thread. Never played roleplaying game myself but I am interested in a more simplified version of Brikwars I made. I could never find anyone to playtest it though. I would like to see pictures also Dr. Lucky.

Which besides being mostly off topic brings me to leave my thoughts about the one year themes. LEGO needs to create a theme so generic (early castle) that is sells and customers can do nearly endless things with the parts or they need to design a non-licensed theme based in collecting. A table top war game like War Hammer or a minifigure game like one of the clix games. Something that people would want to collect and have multiples of sets for. A game similar to Warhammer in particular is a good idea. It broadens the user base to older customers and utilizes LEGO's most important and profitable item the minifigure. With hundreds of minifigure parts and accessories available in dozen of colors LEGO is sitting on billions of unique combinations for such a game. They could make it totally fantasy and still maintain the non modern war theme easily and go for something either past or futuristic. Just to be sort of on topic, Batman will possibly see a few additional sets but most likely end within two years time. Get the sets you want now as I don't see them being available for too long.

Well in the $1000s. Probably somewhere around 5 I would guess. Never paid retail for more than a handful of sets so I have gotten a lot for that amount. Too much in fact :-D

Very cool video. The movie switch at the end is great. I really like the temple though. The lighting and details are great.

Kmart and Target have clearance LEGO right now. Depending on which state you live in will depend on what is available and at what price. Check it out today for good deals! And don't forget to go back before July ends to try and snag the elusive 75% off items! Good luck hunters!

Downwind is never a good place to be with animals around. I loved this set a a child. Great play value and a good price too!

If it is a good game then I don't care who wins! Go football!

I lost my grandma a few years ago. Saddest loss I have ever had. Sometimes I go through life thinking she is there at her house and I could just go visit. And then I remember she is not. :'-( Thank you for the reminder. It is good to keep a focus on what is important in life. Friends and family should always be important to us. I am glad you are doing well.

Customclone is right in that LEGO is not a poor man's toy or hobby. Only at 50% off or more does it become affordable to nearly everyone. Some pieces are worth more per ounce than gold is. What other toy can claim that? I think if you want a set either wait for a sale or a price markdown. Paying full price is paying too much. The only exceptions should be sets not available on sale or limited run sets that dissappear the second they are on sale. LEGO is a bargain at 50% off in almost every case. Maybe not with a few sets but nearly all of them are. Though 75% is the real winner. New $50 sets at $12.50 are some of the best deals I have gotten. Not lately but oh how sweet those were.

Not my style. I like the clean and futuristic interior. The ship looks good from the front but not as much from the sides or back. The shape is weird but not bad and the greebs are done nicely and well thought out. Not enough studs showing again. It seems like the whole purpose of SNOT is hide studs instead of finding new ways to build. There are some really great techniques used in this but for other parts it seems like the only reason to use snot is simply to make it studless. Meh, personal taste.

Eh! Have a great day you black hearted sea dog! *pirate*

I still think LEGO should have released a second and larger fort on one of the raised 32x48 baseplates with red coated soldiers. Even in LEGO scale the castles of SYSTEM fame reached this size before the Pirate line ended. Though not extremely huge it would be the largest size I think LEGO would have gone. Much like the ITP only a fortress instead. The main reason LEGO needed a fortress like this is there are currently no land based forts adequate enough to deal with not only pirates but a neighboring enemy that might attack from the land instead of the sea or both at the same time. Eldorado can protect a port from the sea attacks but what will prevent the Spanish from landing away from the bay and sacking the defensless port on land? Not to mention the islanders or rogue captians that might want to oust Broadside to gain favor with the King!

These and all MB are starting to look more like Playmobil than LEGO. They barely even look like LEGO anymore. No real loss other than the lack of pirate sets in general.

Well that does look nice. Certainly something LEGO never did but should have. The crew is a little small but seeing as the ship and crew are obviously beyond human it is probably enough. I like the helmsman best I think. Not too predictable but he looks like he fits the part. The tissue sails give it the old and "haunted" look. The ship despite being very short has plenty of detail and a lot of sails. I would say this is a clipper of some kind. The final question though, when can you see the ship. Does it sail endlessly on the seas, can you only see it around midnight or is it a ship that hides within the bermuda triangle?

Well the Barque and the Frigate are very similar. As times change so do names and just about everything else. The Greeks had galleons as did others before them I am sure. As ships progressed everything about them did also. The ships commonly refered to as pirate galleons were a form of Barque/Clipper/Schooner as all ships with sails are closely related. From what I have read it seems ship size, rigging type and purpose determined its name mostly along with the language the design originates from. So technically you could have a huge clipper though most were not huge or even mix the styles and create a new type of ship. If we wanted to strat listing the ship types and names you would have to begin with "a log" and work your way up to hovercraft listing so many varieties and contry specific styles that you would have a list too long to bother reading. And that doesn't even begin to touch the developmental, futuristic or scifi type of stuff. *wacko* As long as you know what you ship does it doesn't really matter what it is classed or called though. All proper ships should have a specific name of their own anyway. ;-) Build what you like, call it what you want, geek over how many LEGO lives it took to adequetely feed the plastic sharks just off pirates cove. As long as it is fun, MOC on!

I would think so. Sort of small and not much of a build but it is a ship. Did you add any details or improve it from the similar LEGO version? Sailed ships (those used by pirates) Barque (pronounced bark) is a three masted transport type of ship Clipper (so named for speed) is a multimasted transport ship usually smaller in size (not in sail) Dinghy (or rowboat) is a small craft that is either oar powered or sail powered (most large ships have one) Keelboat (similar to a river boat) is a smaller ship used to navigate rivers Catamaran (or multi hull) is a fast and small craft used for quick travel, large sail, more stable Schooner known by having the sails in a line with the ship as opposed to across it (think windwaker not raft) There are a lot of names but these are the basic types. Any one of them could and at one point probably were outfitted for war. Most ships were merchant or transport vessels though. There are other types of ships that are oar based such as a Galleon or the Viking Longboat also. I think this ship is great. It has that spooky feel and look. The only thing really missing is the ghastly crew and some tattered sails. Be sure to make a separate thread for this once you get it finished. This is nice!

I don't think that is the actual set. I think this is a replica he made to look like the original. The colors are completely off and the figures are not even close to what the LEGO set will have. A good build but not the real LEGO version.

The easiest way to add size to a LEGO set is exactly what LEGO does themselves. They built upwards or lifted it up. Many pirate sets did this and castle also. Though I am not fond of the raised baseplates but an aditional story the the building might help. One way to make it look good would be to add more arches, pillars and roof areas at different angles or over lapping each other. It could add the illusion of size while being not that large or using that many pieces. In other words juniorize it! Another thing to consider is that LEGO never expanded the theme to what it could have or should have been. Most of the pirate sets were on islands or water except for the giant islander set which is obviously near a river of some kind. They never did make a port town or anything of that kind but they should have. If I were to make a true mansion I would have it be at least three stories (18 bricks tall) in height and take up the majority of a 16x16 yellow baseplate. Mansion has always been relative but clearly means larger than the rest of the buildings around it. Eldorado Fortress is merely that, a fort. It is not a barracks, an inn, or anything else. That is why it is not very large. It is not the be all end all of protection againt Pirates. If you want it to be the largest, simply don't make a mansion. If you want to have a all in one fortress then eldorado is only a small island fort used as a launch point or defensive choke point, while a larger fortress built to protect a town would be made later.

Well this is looking good. If you want suggestions I would first say that you change the name to something like The Govenors Villa or something as this is no mansion. Secondly, drop the cannon and the pirates as this is not a war MOC but a "living" one which LEGO rarely created but should have. In place of the canon I would add a two story (4x4x10) bell tower with a one brick high roof and of course a bell in it. I would also expand the dock a little and add some barrels or textile bundles (colored plates). If you need to have a pirate add one in some stocks out on the dock or something similar. One of the corner pieces should use the brick pattern to add variety. A small crane of some kind might also be a nice feature. I can picture this as an imperial villa located on a stream that empties into a bay or deep within a bay too shallow for anything but rowboats. I think you nailed the overall look of the imperial sets but you may have too many figures. The plants are great, more than what you would see in the older sets but not too much at all. I would like to see your redesign if you make one. MOC on matey!

It is either a cast of the original or a paint job of some kind. I would say paint personally.

Exactly!

This looks odd. It reminds me off the Power Ranger vehicles that would join together to make one badly colored mecha which would then be kicked into a cardboard building. :-| :-D I like the design and the weapons are looking good but like others have said, less will be more. I don't like mecha with only two or three colors but neither do I like them with 10 and seemingly no pattern or reasoning behind the design. My advice is to drop all the yellow, red, sand red, trans neon green and possibly the black parts from the model. That still leaves you with blue, sand blue, both grays, the smoke canopy, trans orange and if you want to keep them the trans red globes. Of course you may not have the parts needed to do so. :-/ The shoulder design looks good, bulky and armored but not too much. The legs a a good size but I am not sure if posing works as well as the EXO force type does. I think it would look better in red/sand red but with the aliens teal and blue/white the blue/sand blue looks better. Toss in a human pilot and it could go either way. LoM has by far some of the worst color cominations ever and almost no two sets (alien) matched. They did however introduce great sand colors and some nice printed parts like those you have used. Nice Mecha even if it has bad colors. MOC on!

The brown seems out of place for me. Everything else is classy though! The mini monorail, the fuel contianers, the "mars" landscape and just about everything is great.