MAB

D&D is not really any worse than any other licensed series.

Due to the armour? I bought loads of the Heroic Knight CMF for the same thing.

I doubt a LOTR CMF line would be as interesting as it might sound, at least for existing LOTR LEGO fans. CMF have to appeal to a lot of people, unlike the large 18+ sets, so almost certainly they would repeat the nine characters in the Fellowship. This is what they did with the Simpsons CMFs (repeating the main five each time, and having them in the Simpsons House) and the Harry Potter series (repeating Harry, Hermione, Ron). It woudln't be so bad if they gave them new outfits, but even if they did, it would probably be just slightly different prints like going from the 2012 sets to Rivendell. For anyone that already has the original figures or the newer figures, that would probably be not so inspiring. Then what do they do with the other three places (or 7 if they go for 16 in the series). That could make or break it for existing fans. A CMF series would be a nice way to introduce a lot of characters not seen in the boxed sets and I am sure a lot of existing LOTR LEGO fans would like this, but given there are no small sets then the number of people wanting incidental characters if they don't already have the main characters is going to be relatively small compared to those for other licenses where the CMF can be used by themselves or to add to widely available sets.

If kids want small and reasonably affordable toys that transform between robot and vehicle easily and reliably, won't they just buy Transformers?

Yes, photos of you with your sets (or anything that should be covered under your insurance that is not valuable enough to be listed as a separate item) can help prove you had them for an insurance claim, better than if you had no photos or other records. Keeping photos of the receipts is also pretty easy too these days. You can always ask the insurer what they suggest you keep.

I had the same feeling when I saw the leaks. These look a bit Ninjago or Monkie Kidd like to me. Some of the torsos are OK (I hope) and the armour might be useful, but I don't like the cartoony teeth necklace, for example. Still, better than Chima with the blue orbs on the torsos. I was hoping for something more like the S3 CMF elf. That torso and other parts can be used for more varied characters and is generic enough to army build too.

I don't know the source but this looks great. There are lots of great details but my favourite part is the use of those technic bricks, they work really well for the windows.

Either way, you wait. So wait and see.

Sorry, it wasn't really aimed at yours in particular so my comment is possibly out of place. Yours looks pretty much the standard modular on a MILS base. Elsewhere, a number of people are calling their City designs MILS but have variable width roads and paths or roads that are not centred at so on. The modulars are fairly consistent so naturally fit together reasonably well.

These deviate quite a lot from the original MILS system. I remember reading hispabrick when MILS was being developed and there are really quite strict rules about design and boundaries so that MILS plates can be used in a collaborative way. And it was designed for landscapes (L). So many people are now using them for City and Modular builds, I wonder if now I the time for MICS (Cuty), with rules for joining pavements and roads across boundaries. Of course, for personal rather than collaborative use, standards are less if an issue but I've seen so many youtubers doing their own versions that could never be used in a collaborative way that the original system was designed for.

Having other characters that wouldn’t normally appear in CMF, like the traditional British police constable, is also a way to get interesting figures. An obvious one they could do is a Canadian Mountie style character.

It was even better in the more distant past. Licensed parts were fairly frequently added by mistake and only removed after a couple of weeks so were quite easy to get hold of. And loads of pricing errors giving free parts or very cheap parts (5p for some torsos, and so on). And very fast turn around.

Yes, but then that is similar to the more recent buildable action figures. These have many more attachment points for system parts, but still out of scale with minifigure worlds.

Galidor can be fun, especially if you see at as semi-realistic human and robot parts that can connect with system built parts. I remember spending hours with my kids making arms and legs and occasionally heads to attach to the Galidor bodies. My (possibly unpopular but maybe not) opinion about Galidor is that many of the haters are only haters as they have been conditioned into thinking that by others without actually playing with it.

The boat is pretty accurate compared to the movie. The shark is so much bigger than people, and would be about 20 studs long based on minifigure height. I'm glad that it isn't just a single molded part at that size. The shark and boat are the main parts of the set, and should be buildable. If people want accurate scale models that do not need to be assembled, well there are other brands that make such stuff.

I've also had errors recently, whereas I never had errors in the past going back to about 2012 when I first started using the old replacement parts service. My last order about a month or so ago was missing ten torsos (all the same torso), so I guess that this lot was either not picked or picked and put in another customer's bag.

It is not so much that resellers will lose money, but that they will control the market for a long time if the LEGO price is cheap (or even just reasonable). They could have sold it way cheaper but you will not get a look in, as resellers or people saying they really need 200 goats for themselves and friends, will continually wipe out stock even if they are per order limits. The only way LEGO could really combat it without a high price is to have a reasonable not too high but not too low price and have maybe 50000 ready to go. That way, they shouldn't sell out as the appearance of constant availability puts off second, third, fourth orders of 200 at a time. Resellers can really only make quick money if the part goes out of stock, otherwise it is a case of long term storage for high profits or very small profits or just avoiding losses if they buy parts that LEGO has continually in stock.

You are very unlikely to receive new condition bricks pre 1985 unless you paid a premium for them. If they were new in a sealed set of that age, usually the set is worth more than the parts. That turns around for modern sets, but new vintage sets have a significant premium compared to vintage parts. And if it was parted out, the seller would probably note their age, as again there would be a premium for parts that age in new condition.

I doubt the drop in price was due to customer complaints. It had only been available for what, a couple of hours?

Capes used to be relatively decent value. Prior to about 2016 or 17, in the UK, torsos used to be 53p and individual capes were generally about 50p, occasionally 60p but you had to phone to get them. One time I wanted 20 dark green capes and the only way to get them was buy the box for the Ra's al Ghul set. I think it was £1.98 for the box as it also had the collar cape, and Batman's and Robin's capes. I remember £40 seemed expensive for 20 capes but now it seems quite cheap. And of course I was able to sell on the unwanted capes. But the prices for capes now really outpaces the prices for torsos when they used to be similar.

They look great. Very memorable even though I haven’t watched that movie in decades.

No, I haven't built it yet. I've looked through the instructions online but was planning on building it when the evenings get dark. Although if it is selling well at that time, I'd sell it. I already have a lot of grey LEGO!

Haven't they sent you any emails about them recently? My Mountain Fortress was delivered last week. Although Europe might be earlier delivery than the US.

That is what I was thinking. I couldn't tell if the LOL was a joke that it had increased in price, or a joke that it hadn't.

In line with other CMF exclusives, I guess not unless it gets put into a regular box set. Although that goat is already reasonably priced on BL, especially if bought with the "free" minifigure parts. I'm hoping they do another couple of colours before they retire the mould, maybe a tan one, a dark tan one or one in a colour like dark orange. It will look more realistic than an army of white goats and grey goats.