SirBlake

It's been a fruitful MOC day. In building a modular castle, it's important to be able to turn a corner, so I added a wall with options to either continue in a straight line and bump the wall in a bit, or turn a 90° angle. This set also includes some bad guys. One to sit in jail, one to bust him out. Since it is a jail, it made sense to include the ubiquitous secret passage to escape through. This set is about 125 pieces, and could easily go for $12ish. Next up is the Blacksmith. Starting with the template wall's dimensions, I added a forge and chimney, plus an anvil. Everything the castle blacksmith needs. It also comes with a bad guy and little siege position catapult. It too is designed to be modular and connect with other siege walls/weapons. This set is 153 pieces, and could go for $15.

I'm planning on making the smaller sections all quite different. Color on the roofs, different configurations to accommodate a forge for a black smith for example. I was just working out dimensions on this first one. I've actually made good progress today. Should have some more to post tonight. B

Thanks for the feedback. I do have spots of color there, but this may be playing to my own tastes in that I personally prefer a little less. Well, from the original classic castles through 2013, they almost always have, so I added them in there. Trying to stick with a classic aesthetic here.

This project is growing out of the discussions we've had here, how one of the best parts of Classic Castle was the modularity and flexibility of sets. To that end, I've started to build a theme that is taking that concept to the next level. The idea is that if this were an actual Lego theme, each section would be purchased separately, most of them coming with bad guy siege equipment, so the castle is whatever size and formation you can imagine. These are built from a perspective of actual lego sets, so piece count and building techniques are being purposefully limited. Though I am stocking it with Crownies, I had envisioned this theme with the good guys sporting dark red, which would be a cool addition to the themes and heraldries we've gotten so far. I started out with the gate, since that's the largest set and it will serve to dictate a lot of things as far as style goes. The function of the portcullis is similar to the Kingdoms castle with a couple of exceptions. There is a gear mounted on the axle piece that works with linear gear teeth that are attached to the back side of the portcullis. The drawbridge is also connected to this axle on the outside, so as the portcullis is raised, the drawbridge chains wrap around and simultaneously lower the draw bridge in a single motion. Please excuse the white channel bricks and the fact that there aren't quite enough of them, but I didn't have the larger bley pieces to spare for this MOC, so you'll have to use your imagination a bit on that one. This next piece works as a sketch without much in the way of concept or detail. What I'm working out here is a standardization of wall section that can house castle necessities like armory, blacksmith, king's throne, etc. I'll be working to build out these and more soon. Let me know what you think. I'm going to continue to work on this one, and will hopefully have some more built out and posted this weekend.

It's good to hear further confirmation, but there is no new information in that report.

Man, I couldn't disagree with this more.

If this theme turns out to be as bad as we fear, and if there's no real castle theme during its run, we're in for some dark days ahead.

We all know this is a toy company with a focus on what sells to children. That knowledge does not invalidate our opinions as AFOLs. I know why TLG sometimes makes decisions toward shallow concepts and unsophisticated design. That awareness does not mean I or anybody else has to be happy about it.

All of those reasons. Add to that the heraldry designs, which paled in comparison to Kingdoms even though it was still lions vs dragons. The cherry on top? No nice civilian sets like MMV or MVR.

Your opinion is your own, and as valid as anyone's. That said, your affection for KKII is likely a product of you being a kid at the time. I was not a kid at the time, and the late 90s/early 2000s were fuel for my dark ages because in my own opinion, it was a time of unsophisticated design for Lego castle. Gimmicks and power ranger rip offs. Don't let anyone tell you you're wrong for liking what you like, but there are good reasons that KKII is the most reviled theme for most of us here.

Yeah it is!

Return of the jelly beans. Nothing wrong with unique characters, but the power rangers thing is just so tired.

Oh dear.

Hahah, nice!

That's helpful! As far as color, I was thinking along the lines of KK2 with power rangers colors.

Hahah, I bet you are. Did you know the Cowboys have won five Super Bowls? Seriously though, a walking castle that rolls... Sounds pretty out there. To anybody that's seen any pics, what kind of colors are we talking about? Jelly bean Knights? How about weapons? Traditional swords or wacky oversized?

I did NOT want to be right.

Well, at least it's friendly banter. Yeah we do.

Awesome! Now I'm actually excited either way this goes. Thanks for being a good sport, and.... HOW 'BOUT THEM COWBOYS!? LOL

Hahah, amen brother. Amen to that too. Gentleman's bet: if we get wave 1 pics and there are no goofy vehicles like the ones that are all over chimago, I'll change my avatar to the NY Yankees logo (shudder) for 30 days. If there are, you change yours to a Dallas Cowboys logo for 30 days. Sound fun? :-D

Does "Lion Attack" sound like a monster truck? Does "Royal Fighter" sound like a tank? Those are just two quick examples grabbed from Chima, and they are in fact a lion-shaped monster truck and a tank thing that looks like a reject from burning man. My caution does not come from cynicism, it's a defense mechanism to avoid disappointment.

If there's a helicopter, jet or freaking tank, it doesn't belong in the historic forum. We haven't seen pics, so that is unknown at this point, but every sign is pointing at this theme being chimago v3.0. If that's the case, I would prefer it not junk up my favorite forum on EB. If it means it's dead in here, so be it. At least it'll still be true to its roots.

Based on the way this theme seems to be headed, I think I'd be just fine with that. I'm still holding on to the hope of a pleasant surprise (that it won't be goofy like ninjago/chima), but it doesn't seem likely.

Have any of you folks paid attention to the action themes to know this?: Do news and photos of Big Bang themes usually follow a similar schedule to other non-BB themes? What I mean is, do you think we can expect pics to leak around the same time as creator or city sets, or are BB themes more closely guarded?

Pics would fix everything. See what you're doing to us, TLG!?!?