MAB

I'm not a fan the eagle or ent, but the build on its own is great for the scale. Are the sides at the bottom just 1*4 tiles wedged into place?

There are many fans of the SW and SH themes that are just as passionate about Lego as anyone into Castle, Space and Pirates. But there are also the casuals, as you call them, that will also but these lines but are much less likely to buy Castle, Space and Pirates. As to loyalty, I don't think it matters too much, especially for children's ranges. It is better to appeal to kids that will be interested in Lego for maybe about 5-8 years during their childhood than it is to appeal to long term 'loyal' fans. A loyal fan might buy 5-10x as much as a kid, but the number of these fans is tiny compared to the number of kids getting Lego.

I'd question whether fans of Classic Castle, Space and Pirates (exclusively) are dedicated to Lego as a brand. They are dedicated to Lego Classic Castle (Space / Pirates) as a brand but not Lego more generally if they don't buy other themes. If Lego decided there was not enough money in those three themes, what have they lost if they stop producing them? Sure they may lose long term fans that exclusively follow those themes but then those fans weren't buying enough product anyway. Those fans don't buy other Lego products, so they wouldn't have been buying anything for the past few years. There is no loss there. They were not loyal to Lego, but to just one Lego theme that they decided to no longer produce. Lego doesn't only appeal to kids, there are plenty of adult / older kid sets - architecture, modulars, technic, etc. The kid ranges should in my view primarily be aimed at kids. Long term fans of themes that are primarily aimed at children may feel important but they are a small portion of the market when it comes to buyers of those themes. I say that as someone that would love to see a large adult style castle or medieval set or series, or a history based theme. But I also recognise that type of series won't sell as well as City, Harry Potter, Star Wars, and probably even Nexo Knights. But I have no doubt castle will come back soon enough, but kid focussed with simple builds and carriages. Space will probably also be back but not classic space, of the blues and greys type. That had its place in time, any new space theme needs to be futuristic for today's kids, not kids of the last generation.

So if Lego redid LOTR for example, you'd have no interest in the sets for parts? If an HP set comes with lots of tan or greys, no interest? An ideas set with lots of useful parts in useful colours?

Lego does though. And they have control. And I doubt they care what you like. Or me. Or any individual. They care about what large numbers of people will buy.

He didn't buy from bricklink, he bought from an EU seller. You do have the right to cancel, and you should have just told the seller that. He still has the right under bricklink rules to leave a NPB warning for you.

Any sound effects? How 'bout some more beans Mr Taggart?

Another product line, plus one that has little future / combined sales (if it is the only one in the theme), that is in competition with other current sets. Lego likes to have themes, as once a kid gets one, they like to have more of it. If it is a one set theme, there is little chance of other purchases on the back of the first. Of course, there are examples of it working - Disney Castle, Simpsons (the House, before Kwik-E-Mart was announced) although both were backed up by CMF series and, importantly, were IP driven. People knew what they were, which helps to drive sales. It has also worked with (some) ideas sets. But again, the good selling one-off sets tend to be ones that advertise themselves through an IP. For example, how many people would have bought a big generic rocket compared to how many people would have bought the Saturn V?

Although if they are buying large quantities from other themes, presumably they are fans of those themes too. Does not having a castle line affect that? Maybe, but I imagine it is quite minor.

That's the point though. Why respect them (us)? If lego can make more money by diverting any production capacity, advertising costs, warehousing, etc to sets that are part of a range that will sell in huge quantities to kids or to expensive sets that are aimed at adults and complement other current sets / ranges (so UCS SW) and will get good press coverage, why bother with doing sets that will sell in not such large quantities. I'd imagine if they ever did a large D2C set based on castle or space, it would be like Tower Bridge in terms of longevity. A very slow seller, and out for years.

I don't think one set in a theme per year would work so well, especially if they do varying sizes. Imagine them doing a small castle set, say $20, a space at $50 and pirates at $99. And nothing else. It is hard to market them, even in a catalogue, where do they put them? Kids / families are unlikely to buy into the castle range, as there is one small set and nothing else to go with it. The idea that something else might come in year is meaningless, the majority of kids grow in then out of lego relatively fast. The rabid fans will never be pleased. One set will just mean they could have done so much better, if only they had done a whole theme instead ... and made it evergreen. And not aimed at junior. And made the characters I want. And only did big detailed sets, not small ones. And no carriages. HP has a huge advantage though, in that many of the fans are kids. The age group that lego is aimed at. Sales were apparently not great for LOTR and The Hobbit, which could have been a significant reason for not finishing LOTR after the Hobbit sets were done. I don't think HP will impact on castle. However, if sales of the sets are good, I expect it to last at least as long as LOTR/Hobbit and probably longer.

Maybe not long - longer term like SW, but I imagine HP will last longer than 1-2 years. The fan base is huge, and worldwide too. It wouldn't surprise me if it lasted longer than LOTR + Hobbit combined.

And don't forget Boromir's hair ...

That gothic half-arch piece has been out for five years now. Why would a designer say that they may make them in the future, when they have existed for half a decade? Plus the smaller double half arch piece is missing from the set in the official press release.

Seeing as you have used custom parts, I guess you know that brickwarriors make a very nice sarissa?

Is there any reason Nexo Knights was not mentioned in the themes in the sub-header for this section? Adventurers, Agents, Alpha Team, Aquazone, Atlantis, Dino 2010 / Dino Attack, Elves, Ninjago, Pharaoh's Quest, Power Miners, Rock Raiders, Time Cruisers It has been a bigger theme than most of those, was (still is) current, yet doesn't get a mention.

No! It has already been stated that the half arch pieces are NOT in the set. Quote from above in this very thread ... "Does this mean that the 1x3 half arches are not in the final model?" Sorry, they are not in this model and should never have been shown at this point - we may make them in the future.

Yes. If they think there is a business case for a set, then they can change the part count and design and significantly reduce the number of minifigures as they please. Given that they didn't makes it seem like there is not a business case for a very large Addams family house/set.

K'nex did both blind bags and a series. They look like those, just with the bodies replaced with lego ones.

You'll get a non paying buyer warning. Ask the seller for a cancellation due to shipping costs. In future, ask first.

I imagine it will. Look at modulars now and modulars in 2010. The number of new parts and their use has increased quite dramatically, especially decorative type pieces. It makes sense that Lego reuses them in multiple colours. However, I still see any future castle as likely to using mainly panels, flat or part cylinder, for the bulk of the build.

I can see the headlines now. Professor X from University of Somewhere complaining about the incorrect plot line in new LEGO theme.

Yes, but that's good as I want a fleshie Arthur, not yellow. :-)

But what do you mean by design the sets in a classic way? After all, most Classic Castle castle sets were fairly "square" castles, with towers and a gateway. That is actually what the last King's Castle looked like, just modernised. So they were giving us modern versions of Classic Castle but AFOLs didn't want them.

The problem with that is that they will miss out minifigures that people want if they just do a small part of a (known) saga. Get Arthur and Lancelot and Guinevere, hopefully Merlin and Mordred, but probably no Uther Pendragon or Morgan la Fay. Or maybe just a small set, containing Arthur and Lancelot.