moschino

Wonderful thread. Thank you for this.

I would love to see one of these two historical themes. The age of Napoleon, some french buildings or his siege against Russia with some russian buildings would be a great addition to Lego. The third Crusade also will give to Lego very nice new designs and minifugres.

I think Clipper's sails are much more natural, and they definitely fits better in the same scene with Black Seas Barracuda or Skull's Eye Schooner because they all have sails with vertical lines. Blue is a royal colour, so the sails remain flawless to me. Imperial Flagship has nice sails but they don't fit that well with the Pirates sails in the same scene. However, I go for the Imperial Flagship because I find this ship one of the most elegant ships of all time even if is not that impressive in size. Caribbean Clipper looks a bit fat, its overall shape being too round. Maybe another hull added there would have change my opinion.

This is true, and this is due to their bad policy. They have the option to press the button for like or dislike the review. This option shouldn't be bad, but if you get many dislikes, then your review becomes hidden and at the end it gets even deleted. I posted many reviews on Brickset, some of them rated the set with 4-5 starts, and some of them rated the set with 1-3 stars. Obviously, where I rated the set with 1-3 stars, two months later my review didn't exist anymore, so the sad conclusion is that you were completely right. Brickset reviews are totally useless because they always show great is the set but never judge the set as it is with its own bad aspects.

Yes, this is indeed a bad situation. I'd buy a MISB from eBay, but I'll definitely not keep it as it was described because rarely the description is 100% accurate. I would feel extremely bad to pay a lot of money for a MISB and discover 10-20 years later that I've been waiting for nothing because the set wasn't MISB. You have to read carefully Seller's feedback and communicate with him/her a lot before you buy so you'll have a hint if you should put your trust in Seller's description. These kind of scams use to happen in 2-3 cases out of 10.

Your comment is polite, I respect your thought and I guess many others accept each other's opinion agreeing or disagreeing, but we're not here to ask for anyone's agreement, so we're free to express ourselves. I personally completely disagree with what you've said as I think TLG should made products at least 50% including for adults. When I say this, I don't mean 50% of the products should be dedicated to adults, but I mean the sets that are made should respect a bit of the adults preferences. For example, my parents, and parents of my friends would have never bought us a Lego that they completely disliked. I won't do the same for my kids only because this is the education I've got, but because everyone got that sort of education and because a kid needs to be directed and educated by an adult, so I'll take that as a responsibility and I'll lead him/her to grow in a smart way. For example, I won't really be happy to see my son playing with violence between skeletons and blue ninjas on the floor of our living room, so the result is that I won't buy him Ninjago. I will try to lead my own son to not be violent, but to be creative, so when he ask for Ninjago, I'll try to explain him why Adventures-Egypt is better. I'll open his cultural interests of the most ancient civilization firstly by buying toys regarding the most ancient civilization. If his interests will still go for Ninja, then I'll respect his interests and I will buy him a set of Ninja 1999. I'll work with him and I'll educate him what is a pagoda roof. I'll learn him that a ninja is black and not blue or green, then I will watch him how he plays with a black ninja. Another example, and will be the last... is Atlantis. If he/she has interests in underwater, then I will definitely go for Divers 1997. I will educate the kids of what diving is and I will be extremely happy to watch them how they simulate a diving on the floor of our living room. But I'll tend to refuse to encourage them into play with Atlantis, because I don't want the kids when woke up to tell me they dreamed red monsters attacking a submarine. If they just woke up and they tell me they dreamed how they dived in the deep ocean and they sneak between sharks to find the treasure, then I'll say "well, this is indeed a nice dream, you're and adventurer". So if TLG continues to ignore adults only because their target is between 5-12, then it may lead to fail. The 5-12 years old Kid doesn't have his own earnings and he can not afford anything without adults support. As I won't bring him/her games, books, magazines who disturb his/her perception, innocence and creativity, I will do the same with Lego and for most of the new series it will be a big SKIP.

I really like how sounds "nasty piece of plastic". You made me laugh. Well, me too I was surprised. I don't think there's anyone who really enjoy that Pirate as being the Captain of the crew. I think people who voted with Pete only intended to sabotage the result of the Poll. I don't dislike Pete, but he's only an outsider so I simply ignore him.

That's what I wanted to say... Well, sorry, but me too I can't count that pirate in this story. If tomorrow Lego will create a Pirates Series for DUPLO, they will create a pirate in pink pijamas and they will name it Captain Roger, that doesn't mean that is a re-brand of the Captain Roger of Lego System. If this guy, would be named Captain Roger, I'll actually find it more as a tribute to System Pirates, so kids of 3-4 years old now have their own mighty Captain who once they grow up, it will turn to this:

Prostitution and Stealth are both the oldest jobs in the world. They date since the human discovered the fire, even earlier. If you think that a good education, or a law, can change the human being which is the same since 200.000 years ago, then I appreciate your optimism. Should I put a gold coin at my window, let it open and go on Holiday for 3 weeks? Then should I wonder why the gold coin is not there anymore? Maybe because that's what humans do since 200.000 years ago? If you don't care of your goods, before anyone's fault, it would be your fault. I suggest to watch Scam City with Conor Woodman. It is a tv-show who shows most of the tricks of thieves around the world, Spain, India, Italy, etc... Before to ask for Police protection, you'd need to ask for your own protection. PS: Get a look at this... You may not understand the concept because you live in Denmark, and your country is not even reaching the top. If you want to read the full article, here it is: HERE Otherwise, you can search on google about crime rates, and you might get the point. If Denmark is an extremely safe country, you're lucky, but globally good manners does not apply on a daily basis.

You're probably not a Pirates fan, and you probably do not have the experience to analyze them, but I will show only one thing, and not more, because this thread is not related to Imperial Flagship or Queen Anne's Revenge. This is how sails bend on these ships. From Left: From Top: And this is a drawing from a real ship: The sails will never bend in the wind like they were represented in Imperial Flagship, and they will always bend like they were represented in QAR, BSB, SES, etc... Being a big Pirates fan, I took this as a joke, and I personally can not look at Imperial Flagship as it is. I do not own ITP, but I saw it for several times in real life and I always took it as a joke. There are many other bad things regarding ITP, but as I said above, this is not the right thread to deep into what ITP is. My fiance wanted to get this set, and I asked her to promise me that she'll let me to modify the set and bring him to a decent stage of display. Until that, I just bought two Black Seas Barracuda to expand my ship collection and I call that a real Lego ship. If I would ever let myself to get impressed by size, then I'll definitely consider ITP the best Lego ship of all time, but until that I consider it only a box who contains lots of pieces and will definitely require my imagination to build a nice Lego ship. First of all, I agree with both of you, but I feel like I need to explain a bit further the story about bags, not because I intend to convince someone, but only because I'd like to make myself understood. I will give only an example, but this is applied to almost every release of Lego of today. If you get a look at the last wagon of this train, the wagon between locomotive and prison is the same with the last one, they being completely identical. This wagon has its own bag, so when I experienced the build of the wagon, I felt like I bought a set of this size: Of course, when I built the whole train I felt like I actually bought the following sets: What I really want to say is that when I bought a large set in 1995, I felt like I bought a large set. Not if I buy a large set, at the end I feel like I bought several small + medium sets. This is a feeling that someone who didn't feel, would be hard to imagine, and overall it's a feeling that I really miss. Regarding the numbered bags, I may be extremely subjective and I may be wrong, but all in all, to me this is something that among all other things, it makes new Lego to be worse than the past Lego. Here I also totally agree with you. Once they start to release other franchises,... their imagination start falling down. Excepting QAR (and I bought it before the release of the movie), I never bought any Lego related to a well-known franchise. I never bought any Lego from Harry Potter, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Prince of Persia, etc... I was a big Turtles Ninja fan in my childhood, but now I'm not going to buy any sets from TMNT. I was also a big fan of SpiderMan, but that doesn't attract me to get any of Marvel sets of Lego. The cartoons were the cartoons and Lego is Lego. To me Lego is something that let my imagination to go free, and I don't need Lego to copy a particular atmosphere from a different universe that already exists and it has its own foundations. All in all, we share the same kind of feeling to the same wonderful toy, and I'm glad we're all here to share our opinions. If my thoughts were found offensive to some Lego fans, accept my apologies, as not this was my intention.

I 100% agree with you, and that's why I didn't post on this thread yet. If I would start to post what I really think, I would probably can't be as diplomat as I should and then of course many people will probably start to hate me or to consider me outdated and not up to evolve. In my opinion, the Lego's golden age is somewhere between 1986 and 1996. This decade proved a lot and implemented the most significant pieces of what Lego really is. There were some very nice series released even after 1996, up to 2002, but then they started to fall badly and in my own opinion Lego is becoming worse each year. The boxes have no plastic trays anymore and they are not as friendly as they used to. The back of the boxes doesn't show any other model you can build with the pieces, so they do not encourage kids to challenge themselves into evolve their imagination and creativity. The instructions became too easy, like they dedicate Lego to kids under 8 years. The plastic bags where bricks come became noted as 1, 2, 3, and they sort the bags to build the model as easy as possible, like I am that stupid that I can't search for pieces as it was in the past. The colours became more shiny just like Lego is dedicated to kids under 5 years old when they need to see something shiny to touch the object. I still buy Lego each year, but I only aim for classic sets (older than 10 years). The only new sets I bought were Queen Anne's Revenge as I consider it a very nice piece of work, and Ghost Train just because I had the impulse to own the new model of ghosts, but now I have in mind to sell the train. Most of the other new Lego sets are considered jokes by me and for many times I consider myself as being insulted by TLG with their new releases. Somehow I'm kind of unhappy there are Lego fans who taste their new jokes, as if if people won't buy them, maybe Lego would wake up from this, and maybe they would start to do a nice job again. But somehow I'm kind of happy that there are Lego fans who still buy Lego products, so this way Lego won't stop their activity and I live with the hope that once every 1-2-3-5 years they will release a new wonderful set such as Queen Anne's Revenge or Haunted House.

You're perfectly right. I never realized that Pirates 2009 were released 20 years after the first pirates. I just missed this connection. You just caught them, so this is what they did behind the scenes. Now if I reflect a bit further into this, I also notice that the first Captain Roger's ship has red&white sails, and 20 years later Brickbeard's Bounty has red&white sails. BSB has a total of 5 sails and BB also has a total of 5 sails keeping the same shape. BSB has enough space to place only 2 cannons per side, and BB also has only enough space to put 2 cannons per side. The masts were redesigned on BB, but the overall shape is almost identically with BSB's. The colour palette also is very similar from BSB to BB, as the most used colors are Brown, Black and Yellow. I don't believe in so many coincidences all together, so to me now it's more than clear that Pirates 2009 are a tribute to Pirates 1989, and Brickbeard's Bounty and Captain Brickbeard are a redesign of Blackseas Barracuda and Captain Roger.

Correct! There are some several strategies of marketing in order to not fail. Lego is doing marketing all over the world and their interest is to not fail, so they have to follow the old strategies. One main rule is to not change the logo. For example, Pepsi changed their logo some years ago and that is the time when they lost a lot in front of Coca-Cola, when Coca-Cola keeps their logo since 1886 and they're doing well without any threat around. Only few weeks after Pepsi changed their logo, there were noticed less sales, and few months later they lost their contracts with various Restaurants such as Pizza-Hut, KFC, etc, in various countries worldwide. Getting back to the point, after 54 years of marketing, Lego is not that stupid to change the logo of the brand named "Captain Roger". Of course, then you can ask, "Then why they just didn't keep Captain Roger in the sets?". Well, because the interval between last pirates appearance and 2009 series was 12 years, and if after 12 years of pause you come with the same brand without any changes, this would prove weakness and a lack of creativity of the company designers and creators, so again, Lego wasn't that stupid to fall in this trap. They knew that a captain who wears black coat, eyepatch on the left eye, hook on the left hand, woodleg on the right foot, and epaulettes, sells, and sells extremely good, so naturally because they wants to sell, then they give us what we want. They kept all these together and they created the pirate captain (as we want), but a bit different than the previous one due to the reason I mentioned above. If they would only change the appearance, but they would have kept the name of Captain Roger, then they would have fall into what Pepsi fall and again, Lego wasn't that stupid. So they simply gave us what they knew we want, and they gave us another name, also by keeping a phonic correlation to the old winner by keeping the word "beard" (BrickBeard / RedBeard) You said something about any official document. A serious company would never say the obvious because their interest is to let things to be interpreted by the user in the way how he likes. A big "Captain Roger" fan would be insulted if you will say him that this new pimp is "Captain Roger", so by not making any official declaration, they gave us infinity ways to interpret the character and guess what... Lego won once more!

$2-3 is not much as long as you really want them. A pizza costs at least $10, so if every friday night instead of buying a pizza you get at least 4 soldiers, then you get 16 soldiers per month, 192 soldiers per year. And it's not like you give up all your desires in change for some soldiers. It's enough to only give up the equivalent of a pizza per week.

Lego is not that small, it only depends what you aim for. For example, Lego 6286 Skull's Eye Schooner has 66cm long, 23cm width and 49cm tall. Lego 6285 Black Seas Barracuda has almost the same size. So if you simply want to display two ships one in front of the other, you'd need more than 1 meter.

Your story is extremely strange to me. TB's average price is about $200. Why would you leave $1200 at your office when you are far away on holiday? Would you be surprised if you'd let $1200 in a metro station over the night, then at sunrise they won't be there anymore? Considering there was a large amount of sets, then you probably planned to sell them by having your own store, so that's why you didn't get them home and you kept them at your office. But then you should have video cameras at your office. Here, where I live, each office has about 5-10 cameras on each office due to its size, then there's another camera in the elevator and many more cameras on corridors. If there were no cameras, no locks, and you left $1200 on the table, don't be amazed they didn't wait for your comeback. With coupon of your shopping and with witnesses who can approve that you came at your office with several TB and you stored them there, you can win the case as long as the defendants thieves does not have any coupons and any credible witnesses.

Thank you very much. Your reply is very helpful to me, so now I will understand what is all about these pine trees. I don't need any help about swords because I know them well. I just gave them as an example, and if I wasn't explicit enough, I can try to be more explicit now. The difference between these two models showed in my post above are that one model is made of ABS plastic (hard plastic), and the the other model is made of soft plastic, probably because kids of that time used to break them. These two different types of swords have two different types of codes, so when I want to buy a particular type of sword, I just enter its particular code on bricklink and I get what I want. Too bad that the trees doesn't have different codes so I assume that if I want the trees with modern round edges, I'd have to ask the seller if they are this way or if they are made of soft plastic with sharp edges. Then I have to hope that the seller will understand what I mean and I will get in possession of what I really want. Again, thank you very much, you reply was very helpful.

You couldn't point it better and shorter. I criticized him in a similar thread jut before the "Pirate Captain of Minifigure series 2012" was included. Pimp is how I will name him in the future.

Hello, Few years ago I bought some spares from eBay and there were 3 x 3471 and 2 x 2435. These were my first trees as I never bought any official set which includes pine trees. I was surprised to notice a difference between the trees even if they were the same model. The difference between them is the same as it is between the Shot Sword, 3847a vs 3847. So, two of my trees are made of the same plastic as is the sword 3847, and one tree is made of ABS plastic same as the sword 3847a. Unfortunately I couldn't find any official difference in their names on Bricklink and I wondered if there is any way to search for the tree that is made of ABS plastic. I'd want to buy several models, but I want that particular model and not the model made of soft plastic. Thanks.

Captain Roger, if you gone for that, you should also create a poll about the best pirate ship as the previous poll is extremely outdated. QAR and BP should definitely be included. Also I think the thread should be dedicated to all ships included Imperial Flagship and Caribbean Clipper. I'd do that myself but I can not create a poll yet because I don't have enough posts.

Yes, a total work somewhere between 4 and 8 hours. I really doubt natesroom can do this in 30 minutes. I work in design since 7 years ago and I'm daily surrounded by many designers of all kinds. Maybe we're just too perfectionsts. I doubt we're all low. PS: natesroom, we all want the background used on Black Seas Barracuda's box. It doesn't matter if you finish it in 30 minutes or in 30 hours. Just do it and share it with us. We'll all be thankful to you.

The Lego room seems to be the biggest problem of all Lego collectors. I actually hate to keep them in boxes, especially on the sets where I don't have the original boxes anymore. But if I keep them exposed for years, they're getting dirty as it's almost impossible to keep them clean over the years. I intend to start a thread about how to create your own display for Lego, debate together and share our ideas. If this was already created, please show the link here.

That's great... let's do it. Yeah, I used an old account of photobucket. This is not the best picture to represent them because it was used the flash, but this is what I had. The patches are not painted, but sewn. Well, I think it took me 2 days, working about 2-4 hours per day.

Thank you for your compliments. The sails are natural and I worked on them pretty much to finish them as they are. (that was 5 years ago) During the time I experienced various methods of creating sails. I also re-created all SES sails just to get rid of the skull. I always use material, and I make them as when you touch them, you can't feel or see any difference between original sails and custom sails. Unfortunately I didn't shoot many pictures before I disassembled it, but I found a photo. PS: When I tried to attach it, I get this message: Error This file was too big to upload You can upload up to 5.59K of files (Max. single file size: 5.59K) Maybe a moderator or the admin can allow a bit more space than just 5 kb.

About a month ago I started to work on this, but I'm not satisfied about the current result, so I'm going to keep this project active and I will release a background when I'll consider it a proper background. Phes was right. At that time Lego created real scenes just as they are created in museums for exhibits. The mountains or the islands we see in these boxes in the first plan were for real, and only the sky was a drawing. I'll finish this job, but I need more materials to do it. I don't have BSB, SES, EF or ITP Box so someone who has any of these, can contribute. I need hi-res photos with a resolution of over 3000 pixels. They need to capture the front box perpendicular to the center of the image and without using the flash. If any of you will share such pictures, I will share the final result.